Stanford prison experiment

Question 1

who were the participants

Answer 1

24 american male undergrad students

Question 2

aim

Answer 2

to see how readily people would conform to social roles in a stimulated environment as an attempt to explain the violent and brutal conditions found in prison

Question 3

what helped him investigate conformity in this (things implemented) (4)

Answer 3

zimbardo watched them and recorded their behaviour throughout so he could see how they conformed to their social roles and how slow/fast they did so
the guards wore sunglasses so it was impossible for them to make eye contact with the prisoners in order for them to not feel any sort of sympathy
prisoners had to shave their heads and refered to as a number showing a loss of social identity
guards could run prison as they saw fit- only thing not allowed is physical harm

Question 4

findings (3)

Answer 4

identification to roles occurred very fast- they adapted to their roles in a very short amount of time
guards rapidly increased having control over prisoners lives
guards began to torment and harass prisoners- they later reported that they enjoyed doing so
guards became more demanding of obedience whilst the prisoners became more submissive showing social roles became more internalised

Question 5

evaluation- strengths (2)

Answer 5

ecological validity- zimbardo went to extreme measures to make it as realistic as possible e.g prisoners were arrested from their homes

lab experiment that was tightly controlled therefore no extraneous variables could interfere with the experiment

Question 6

evaluation- limitations (2)

Answer 6

ethical issues- psychological harm as 2 prisoners got ptsd from it

unrepresentative sample was used- used 24 normal, healthy american college students who were all predominantly white and middle classed