Conformity to social roles

• Stanford prison experiment


  Controlled observation of 24 male student volunteers randomly assigned to roles of 'prisoner' or 'guard'
• Stanford prison experiment


  • Volunteers physically and psychologically screened prior to taking part
  • Prisoners arrested at home, put through delousing procedure, given uniform and ID number
  • Guards given uniforms, clubs, whistles and wore reflective sunglasses
  • Zimbardo took role of Prison Superintendent
  • Study supposed to last 2 weeks but terminated after 6 days
• Guards and prisoners conformed to their social roles


  • Guards became sadistic and cruel - woke prisoners at night, got them to clean toilets with bare hands
  • Prisoners became passive and accepting of their plight, 5 released early due to high anxiety
• The Stanford prison experiment was conducted by Haney et al. in 1973