Neuroscience
The British social psychologists, professors Alex Haslam and Steve Reicher, have put together a wonderful, resource-packed website that documents the science and issues behind their BBC Prison Study conducted and broadcast in 2001/2002.
Rather like Zimbardo's classic Stanford Prison Experiment, Reicher and Haslam's BBC Prison Study involved ordinary participants being split into groups of prisoners and guards.
However, whereas Zimbardo gave his guards leadership, inspiring them to dominance over their prisoners, Haslam and Reicher deliberately stood back from proceedings, to see whether and how the two groups of participants would organise themselves. They also made a number of interventions - for example introducing a new prisoner with real-life trades-union experience -to see how issues of leadership and group identity would affect the behaviour of the participants and their respective groups.
Reicher and Haslam's study goes beyond the idea that ordinary people can sometimes commit atrocious acts in certain circumstances, and aims instead to find out when and why groups descend into tyranny and when and why they draw together to resist oppression and authoritarianism.
The new website features clips and images from the original BBC broadcast; an accessible account of the main findings and their theoretical implications; as well as free downloads of many of the scientific articles and magazine features that have flowed from the Study.
All in all it's a marvellous new resource for students, teachers, lecturers and anyone interested in social psychology.
Link to new website for BBC Prison Study.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
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Neuroscience
New BBC Prison Study website goes live
The British social psychologists, professors Alex Haslam and Steve Reicher, have put together a wonderful, resource-packed website that documents the science and issues behind their BBC Prison Study conducted and broadcast in 2001/2002.Rather like Zimbardo's classic Stanford Prison Experiment, Reicher and Haslam's BBC Prison Study involved ordinary participants being split into groups of prisoners and guards.
However, whereas Zimbardo gave his guards leadership, inspiring them to dominance over their prisoners, Haslam and Reicher deliberately stood back from proceedings, to see whether and how the two groups of participants would organise themselves. They also made a number of interventions - for example introducing a new prisoner with real-life trades-union experience -to see how issues of leadership and group identity would affect the behaviour of the participants and their respective groups.
Reicher and Haslam's study goes beyond the idea that ordinary people can sometimes commit atrocious acts in certain circumstances, and aims instead to find out when and why groups descend into tyranny and when and why they draw together to resist oppression and authoritarianism.
The new website features clips and images from the original BBC broadcast; an accessible account of the main findings and their theoretical implications; as well as free downloads of many of the scientific articles and magazine features that have flowed from the Study.
All in all it's a marvellous new resource for students, teachers, lecturers and anyone interested in social psychology.
Link to new website for BBC Prison Study.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- What The Textbooks Don't Tell You - One Of Psychology's Most Famous Experiments Was Seriously Flawed
Zimbardo speaking in '09Conducted in 1971, the Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) has acquired a mythical status and provided the inspiration for at least two feature-length films. You'll recall that several university students allocated to the...
- Stephen Reicher: Who Am I?
Who am I? I am a jew, but I am no believer and I do not believe that Israel speaks for me. I can’t be sure what it means to be a jew. Yet I am sure that others are sure And I know that jewishness matters. I know that millions were slaughtered for being...
- The Price Of Thinking "it Would Have Been Worse Under Saddam"
After news broke that US soldiers had mistreated their prisoners at the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq, a common reaction among pro-war politicians was to remind the public that: "It would have been worse under Saddam". Whatever the truth of this claim, new...
- More Resources For A-level Students
New podcasts and classroom posters are available for download from the OCR exam board, following two events held in association with the British Psychological Society in January. The resources relate to the core studies part of OCR's new syllabus...
- Challenging The Conclusions Drawn From Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment
Alex Haslam: "The invitation to design the 'most important experiment that’s never been done' is an interesting one, but one that entails a great many dangers. One of these is that by inviting researchers to focus on experiments per se, it encourages...