Evaluation

• One strength of SPE is Zimbardo and his colleagues had control over key variables
• How did they have control?

  • An example of the control they had is through the selection of participants
  • Emotionally-stable individuals were chosen and randomly assigned to the roles of guard and prisoner
• What effect did having control over the selection of Px have on the SPE?

  • Researchers were able to rule out individual personality differences as an explanation of the findings
  • Behaviour must have been due to the role itself
• How does having control affect SPE validity?

  • Increased internal validity of the study
  • We more confident in drawing conclusions about the influence of roles on conformity
• One limitation of the SPE is that it did not have the realism of a true prison.
• Who argued the participants were merely play-acting rather than genuinely conforming to a role?

  Banuazizi and Movahedi (1975)
• How were Px performances based on stereotypes?

  • One of the guards claimed he had based his role on a brutal character from the film Cool Hand Luke
  • This would also explain why the prisoners rioted - they thought that was what real prisoners did
• The SPE not having the realism of a true prison suggests that the findings tell us little about conformity to social roles in actual prisons.
• Who had a counterpoint against lack of realism?

  McDermott (2019)
• What did McDermott (2019) argue?

  The participants did behave as if the prison was real to them
• What evidence did McDermott use to support his argument?

  • 90% of the prisoners' conversations were about prison life
  • Amongst themselves, they discussed how it was impossible to leave the SPE before their 'sentences' were over
• What did 'Prisoner 416' later explain to McDermott?

  He believed the prison was a real one, but run by psychologists rather than the government
• McDermott's counterpoint to the SPE lacking the realism of a true prison suggests that the SPE did replicate the social roles of prisoners and guards in a real prison, giving the study a high degree of internal validity
• One limitation is that Zimbardo may have exaggerated the power of social roles to influence behaviour (Fromm 1973)
• How did Zimbardo exaggerate the power of social roles in influencing behaviour?

  • Only a third of the guards behaved in a brutal manner
  • Another third tried to apply the rules fairly
  • The rest actively tried to help and support the prisoners
  • They sympathised, offered cigarettes and reinstated privileges - Zimbardo (2007)
  • Most guards were able to resist situational pressures to conform to a brutal role
• Zimbardo overstated his view that SPE participants were conforming to social roles and minimised the influence of dispositional factors (e.g. personality).