conformity to social roles

• conformity to social roles definition

  social roles are the parts that people play as members of various social groups e.g. teachers and students. these are accompanied by expectationds that we, and others, have of what is appropriate behaviour in each social role. we internalise these expectations, so they shape our behaviour.
• zimbardo's aim


  to investigate how freely people would conform to the roles of guard and prisoner in a role-playing exercise that re-created prison life
• zimbardo's sample

  a volunteer sample of 24 'emotionally stable' us male university students
• zimbardo's method


  controlled, overt, participant observation
• zimbardo's procedure


  1. volunteers were randomly allocated each student to the role of prisoner or guard

  2. prisoners were arrested at their homes, searched, dressed in smock uniforms and given numbers rather than names

  3. guards were given uniform, night stick, mirrored glasses (uniforms created loss of personal identity)

  4. basement of psychology department in stanford university was converted into mock prison

  5. prisoners were placed in cells with routines created, zimbardo took on role of superintendent
• zimbardo's findings


  - within a day prisoners rebelled (guards responded by locking them in cells)

  - punishment by guards escalated (prisoners were humiliated and deprived of sleep by guards)

  - identification (prisoners referred to each other by numbers rather than names)

  - prisoners became depressed and were released due to showing symptoms of psychological disturbance

  - role play had been intended to run for two weeks but was called off after six days
• zimbardo's conclusion


  - guard, prisoners and researchers conformed to their role within the prison

  - social roles have an extraordinary power over individuals, making even the most well-adjusted capable of extreme brutality towards others
• conformity to social roles criticism (demand characteristics)

  one criticism of zimbardo's research into conformity to social roles is that it is prone to demand characteristics. this is because within his procedure, zimbardo took on the role of the prison superintendent. therefore, zimbardo could have influenced how the participants acted within the study. for example, they may have conformed to their role because this i what they believed zimbardo wanted them to do (demand characteristics) rather than because they were actually conforming to their social role of prisoner or guard due to the prison environment. therefore, lowering the internal validity of the research into conformity to social roles.
• conformity to social roles criticism (ethical issues)

  a further weakness of zimbardo’s research is that there were major ethical issues. there was a lack of informed consent, as the prisoners did not consent to being arrested at their homes. in addition, there was a lack of right to withdraw, when one prisoner wanted to leave he spoke to zimbardo and had to ask to be ‘released’ from the prison, zimbardo responded as the superintendent, rather than an experimenter with a responsibility to the participant. finally, the prisoners were not protected from harm as some showed signs of psychological disturbance.COUNTER ARGUMENT:however, zimbardo carried out debriefing sessions with the participants for several years afterwards, and concluded that there were no long lasting negative effects.
• conformity to social roles support (external validity)


  zimbardo's research has practical applications as it can be used to predict and explain behaviour in the real world. the actions displayed by soldiers in abu ghraib military prison in iraq were found to be similar to zimbardo's findings as prisoners were tortured, humiliated and physically abused. therefore, zimbardo's research can be used when developing prevention programmes to be used for training purposes in prisons. this means that it has become an important part of applied psychology and has good external validity.
• conformity to social roles criticism (gender bias)


  zimbardo's research into conformity to social roles as gender bias, as zimbardo used a male only sample (androcentric). this is a weakness as it is difficult to generalise the findings that people conform to their social roles to women. it could be argued that as the role of guard was a violent one, females would not conform as much due to stereotypically being more caring and concerned for others. thus reducing the external validity of the research in to conformity to social roles.