Social Influence-conformity to social roles

Question 1

What are social roles?

Answer 1

Behaviours that society expects from you.

Question 2

Study to show conformity to social roles?

Answer 2

Zimbardo et al (1973)- Stanford prison experiment

Question 3

Aim of SPE?

Answer 3

To see if the prison guards behaved brutally because they have sadistic personalities (dispositional explanation) or whether it was the situation (situational explanation) that creates such behaviour.

Question 4

Method of SPE?

Answer 4

Male students were recruited to act either as guards or prisoners in a mock prison. They were randomly given the roles of prisoner or guard, and their behaviour was observed. The ‘prisoners’ were ‘arrested’ at a random point in the day, taken to prison and properly processed. They were given uniform and numbers. The guards wore uniforms and mirrored sunglasses.

Question 5

Conclusion of SPE?

Answer 5

Guards and prisoners adopted their social roles quickly. Zimbardo claims that this shows that our social role can influence our behaviour-as seemingly well-balanced men became unpleasant and aggressive in the role of the guard.
Shows the behaviour was situational rather than dispositional as none of the participants had shown these behaviours before.
Individuals readily conform to social roles even when the role overrides their moral beliefs.

Question 6

Result of SPE?

Answer 6

-The experiment was planned to last 14 days but was stopped after 6.
-Guards behaved brutally and abusively towards prisoners (some seeming to enjoy it) and after 2 days the prisoners rioted but when the rebellion was put down they became depressed and passive.
- 5 prisoners had to be released early after experiencing severe negative emotions.
-Even the researchers became caught up in the role play and overlooked the abusive behaviour until graduate student Cristina Maslach stepped in and stopped the experiment.

Question 7

Evaluation of SPE?

Answer 7

-Controlled observation, so there was good control of the variables (high internal validity).
-However, artificial environment means it can’t be generalised to real life situations and has low ecological validity (low mundane realism).
-It has practical applications, as the study can explain why Nazi guards or Abu Ghraib guards acted brutally towards their prisoners.
-Huge problem with ethics, as participants experienced psychological damage.
-Due to problem with ethics, this experiment could NOT be replicated, therefore it can’t be tested for reliability.
-Researcher bias, as Zimbardo was personally involved. Acted as the prison superintendent. Lack of objective view creates issue with findings.
-Study has androcentric bias- it was male dominated.
-There is undermining evidence- Reicher and Haslam’s BBC prison study was a replication of SPE and found completely different results. Suggests that the results of the SPE were not reliable.

Question 8

Which type of conformity is involved in conforming to social roles?

Answer 8

Identification- because when taken out of that role, they adopted the role of other roles required of them in that social situation.