Conclusion and evaluation:
Concluded from the study: after a few days (shorter than was expected) the study had to be stopped due to uncharacteristic behaviours shown, as the role played prisoners and guards conformed their behaviours towards their roles, and adapted to these in order to make it life like however, there was an extent of harm which was occuring.
Therefore, the situational hypothesis is favoured over dispositional hypothesis as none of the participants had shown this type of behaviour before the study. The environment they were in and the roles they had to play and conform to has lead them to show this type of behaviour. They did this despite their moral beliefs about their personal behaviour. They learned this behaviour from media sources e.g. films, and learned models of social power e.g. teachers, parents etc.
Evaluation: Individual differences are important as not all guards behaved brutally; Zimbardo referred to his study as a failure in the sense that prison conditions in USA are now much worse than what was performed in his study.
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