The famous and controversial Stanford Prison Experiment, conducted by social psychologist Philip Zimbardo and his colleagues at Stanford University, demonstrated the power of social roles, social norms, and scripts.

Once data is collected from both the experimental and the control groups, a statistical analysis is conducted to find out if there are meaningful differences between the two groups. A statistical analysis determines how likely any difference found is due to chance (and thus not meaningful). In psychology, group differences are considered meaningful, or significant, if the odds that these differences occurred by chance alone are 5 percent or less. Stated another way, if we repeated this...

Today, scientists agree that good research is ethical in nature and is guided by a basic respect for human dignity and safety. However, this has not always been the case. Modern researchers must demonstrate that the research they perform is ethically sound.

According to Charles Cooley, we base our image on what we think other people see (Cooley 1902). We imagine how we must appear to others, then react to this speculation. We don certain clothes, prepare our hair in a particular manner, wear makeup, use cologne, and the like—all with the notion that our presentation of ourselves is going to affect how others perceive us. We expect a certain reaction, and, if lucky, we get the one we desire and feel good about it. But more than that, Cooley...

People tend to know what behavior is expected of them in specific, familiar settings. A script is a person’s knowledge about the sequence of events expected in a specific setting (Schank & Abelson, 1977). Essentially, scripts are a particular kind of schema, one containing default values for the features within an event. In the restaurant example, the script's features include the props (e.g., tables, menu, food, and money), the roles to be played (e.g., customer and waiter),...

Erik Erikson's fifth stage of psychosocial development, "identity versus role confusion," is crucial during adolescence (ages 12 to 18). In this stage, adolescents face the developmental task of forging a distinct personal identity, a process influenced by social, psychological, and biological changes typical of this period. Adolescents naturally explore different roles, behaviors, and ideologies as they navigate complex questions of self-concept, asking, "Who am I?" and...