Social roles Flashcards
Social roles
The parts people play as members of various social groups
Zimbardo experiment procedures
25 male volunteers
Study into ‘prison life’
Randomly allocated to prisoner or guard
Blindfolded
Sprayed with disinfectant
Given numbers to memorise, referred to by number and supervised all the time.
Given work shifts
Lined up to be counted
The guards were allowed to make up the rules
Zimbardo findings
The experiment started slowly, but guards soon changed their behaviour, which became a threat to the prisoners’ psychological and physical health.
Study was stopped after 6 days instead of 14.
Guards employed ‘divide and rule’ tactic by playing the prisoners off against each other
Enforced rules and punished small misdemeanours
Negative evaluations
Prisoners didn’t give informed consent(to being ridiculed, stripped naked).
There were big impacts on the prisoners’ mental health.
One prisoner had to be released after one day, this showed symptoms of psychological disturbance.
The guards identified with their role the most - becoming brutal and aggressive and appearing to enjoy the power. One prisoner went on a hunger strike, so guards force fed him and put him in the hole.
The guards only stopped after Maslash claimed they were being cruel.
Lack of realism
Role of dispositional influences
Lack of realism(Zimbardo’s experiment)
Banuazizi and Mohavedi(1975) argued participants were merely play-acting rather than genuinely conforming to a role:
Based on stereotypes
Prisoners rioted, because they thought that’s what real prisoners did.
Zimbardo responded:
Quantitative results showed 90% of the prisoners’ conversations were about prison life.
Prison 416 expressed the view it was a real prison, run by psychologists, not the government
Role of dispositional influences(Zimbardo’s experiment)
Fromm(1973) accused Simbardo of exaggerating the power of the situation to influence behaviour and minimising the role of personality factors.
Only about a third of the guards behaved in a brutal manner.
Another third were keen on applying rules fairly and the rest actively tried to help and support the prisoners.
The conclusion drawn that participants were conforming to social roles, could be over stated.
The guards were able to exercise right or wrong choices, despite the situational pressure to conform a role.
Extra negative evaluations of Zimbardo’s experiment
Reicher and Haslam’s BBC replication of SPE(2006):
Findings showed the prisoners took control of the mock prison and subjected the guards to a campaign of harassment and disobedience.
Social Identity Theory - guards failed to develop a shared social identity as a cohesive group, but the prisoners did.
Prisoners actively identified themselves as members of a social group that refused to accept the limits of their assigned role.
Positive evaluations of Zimbardo’s experiment
Real World Application - Abu Ghraib
Control
Supporting research
Real World Application - Zimbardo’s experiment
From 2003-2004, the US Army Military police personnel committed serious human rights violations against Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. The prisoners were tortured, physically and sexually abused, routinely humiliated and some were murdered.
Positives of Zimbardo evaluation - control over some variables
Appropriate selection of participants
Emotionally stable individuals chosen and randomly assigned to the roles of guards and prisoners
Behaviour due to pressure of situation as they were randomly assigned.
Increased the internal validity of the study - different parts of the test gave consistent results.
Supporting research - Zimbardo’s experiment
A mock psychiatric ward - Norma Jean Orlando(1973):
29 staff members of the hospital volunteered to be patients and were held in the ward.
22 staff members were also involved, but they just carried out their normal roles.
Patients started behaving like real patients of the hospital, conforming to the roles assigned to them.
Showed depression and withdrawal and tried to escape
Afterwards, they stated they felt frustrated, anxious and despairing
Lost their identity, and didn’t feel like they were treated as people
Why did they conform(Zimbardo experiment)
Lynndie England claimed she didn’t actually hurt anyone, and this was only because her husband told her,”If you love me, you’ll do this.”
George W Bush - claimed this was an isolated incident, not typical of America
Techniques from Guantanamo Bay detention centre.
In 2009, torture was banned - 2/3s of Americans believe torture is justified
What validity does Zimbardo’s study lack?
Ecological validity - conducted in an artificial environment not reflecting real-like situations:
None of the participants had been in prison before.
The college student prisoners weren’t representative of prison populations in terms of ethnicity, educational attainment and socio-economic status.
The SPE prison term was short relative to those of inmates in real prisons.
