conformity to social roles (zimbardo)

• Procedure: Volunteer sample - 24 emotionally stable men, Prisoners arrested outside their home and taken to the mock prison, Prisoners given smocks and numbers, Guards given uniforms, batons and mirrored glasses

  Findings: Prisoners rebelled to start, Guards gave harsher punishments, Prisoners became depressed and some showed severe stress responses, 3 released early, Supposed to last two weeks but stopped after six days due to harm caused

  Conclusion: Concluded both groups lost their personal identity and conformed to social roles.
• AO3 - Unethical – lack of protection from harm as some prisoners experienced extreme stress responses leading to it being stopped after 6 days and lack of informed consent as participants didn’t know they would be arrested at their homes – limiting the research in to conformity to social roles.
• AO3 - Gender bias – only conducted on males – difficult to generalise the findings to females, they may not have conformed to the social role as it was a violent on (guard) – limiting external validity of research in to conformity to social roles.