zimbardo's research Flashcards
what was the aim of Zimbardo’s Stanford prison experiment?
whether or not prison guards behave brutally due to their sadistic nature or is it influenced by the situation they are in
what are social roles?
the ‘parts’ that people play as members of various social groups, accompanied by the expectations we and others of what is the appropriate behaviour in each role.
explain the Stanford prison experiment procedure…
zimbardo set up a mock prison experiment in the basement of a psychology department in Stanford university. they advertised for students willing to volunteered and selected those who were classed as emotionally stable after various psychological tests. the students were then randomly allocated to the prisoner and guard roles.
to heighten the realism of the exam, the ‘prisoners’ were arrested from their homes by policeman to the prison and then issued a uniform and a number tag. the prisoners names were never used, they were only called by their number. the guards were told they had complete control over the prisoners, for example, deciding whether or not they can go to the toilet
findings of zimbardo’s research
guards took up their roles with enthusiasm however their behaviour became a threat to the prisoner’s psychological and physical health causing the experiment to be called off after six days instead of the intended 14 days.
within two days, prisoners rebelled against the harsh treatment by the guards. they ripped their uniforms and shouted at the guards whom retaliated with fire extinguishers. the guards employed a ‘divide-and-rule’ tactic often abusing their power doing frequent headcounts in the middle of the night.
after the rebellion was shut down, the prisoners showed symptoms of anxiety and depression and became subdued. one prisoner was released on the first day as he showed psychological disturbance, another prisoner went on a hunger-strike in which the guards tried to force-feed him and eventually punished him by locking him in the ‘hole’ in a dark tiny closet.
the guards more and more closely identified with their roles as their behaviours became more aggressive and brutal, with some appearing to enjoy the power they had over the prisoners.
conclusions made to the findings of zimbardo’s research.
the stimulation revealed that the situation did influence people’s behaviours, with the guards, prisoners and researchers all conformed to their roles within the prison
a strength of the zimbardo’s prison experiment
a strength of the Stanford prison experiment is that zimbardo and his colleagues had some control over variables and so increases the internal validity of the study, such as the selection of participants. emotionally stable participants were selected and randomly allocated to social roles in order to rule out the extraneous variable of individual differences.
a limitation of zimbardo’s prison experiment
Banuazizi and Mohavedi argued that participants were merely play-acting as their performance was based on stereotypes of how prisoners and guards are supposed to behave. for example on the guards from the study stated that he based his role on a brutal character from the film cool hand Luke explaining why the prisoners rioted as that is what they imagined real prisoners would do.
however quantitative data gathered during the procedure showed that 90% of the prisoners’ conversations were about prison life and prisoner ‘416’ stated that the prison was a real one just run by psychologists instead of the government. on balance, it seems that the prison situation was real to the prisoners showcasing the experiment’s high internal validity
another limitation of zimbardo’s prison experiment (dispositional influences)
Zimbardo might have exaggerated the power of the situation to influence behaviours and minimising the role of personality factors.
for example, only a third of the guards behaved in a brutal manner with another third trying to apply rules fairly and the last third sympathising with the prisoners.
This suggests that Zimbardo’s conclusion, where majority of the participants conforming to social roles, is over-stated. the clear difference in the guard’s behaviour indicates that they were able to exercise to wrong and right choices despite the situational pressure to conform to a role
outline the ethical issues in the stanford prison experiment…
prisoners were stripped naked without permission
prisoners were assigned numbers and had their names taken, dehumanising them
prisoners were placed in solitary confinement
guards prevented prisoners from going to the toilet, basic human rights, and woke them up mid-sleep to stand on parade.
zimbardo himself overlook the ethical concerns until a graduate student questioned the morality of the situation.