Stanford Prison Experiment Essay

Zimbard's Stanford prison experiment revealed how social roles can influence our behavior. There are many ways that people can influence our behavior, but perhaps one of the most important is that the presence of others seems to set up expectations. We do not expect people to behave randomly but to behave in certain ways in particular situations. Each social situation entails its own particular set of expectations about the proper way to behave. Such expectations can vary from group to group. One way in which these expectations become apparent is when we look at the roles that people play in society. Social roles are the part people play as members of a social group. With each social role we adopt, our behavior changes to fit the expectations

Therefore, people usually tend to slip into predefined roles, behaving in a way that they thought was required, rather than using their own judgment and morals. It doesn’t matter if these are good people or no, they tend to conform even when that means doing horrible things. Surprisingly, people could become subject to obedience when are confronted with higher authorities or the individual personalities of people could be swamped when they are given positions of authority. Those in power become abusive, and those subject to that power become immature, passive, and rebellious. These effects do not have to do with differences in original personality, but result from the situation in which people find themselves. I would say that people in a position of absolute power can easily take it to extremes as well. By having legitimated their actions as necessary and brought on by the target, through a process of cognitive dissonance people can come to believe that they acted morally and appropriately in a given situation while the reality is relatively different. It is just incredible how great an effect the environment has on our individual behavior, capable of trumping what we would otherwise consider our steadfast moral and behavioral guidelines. Individuality so easily melts away as the social environment begins to define the individual. It is scary and amazing at the same time how quickly and easily people adopt in new social