Obedience to authority: Milgram

• What is Milgram’s aim?

  To investigate whether German people obeyed Hitler through obedience and willing to obey orders, which caused them to murder millions of jews.
• What type of experiment was Milgram’s experiment?

  A lab experiment - a fake environment. Risk that participants know its fake so play along.
• What is the sample for Milgram‘s experiment?

  40 American men aged 20-50 years who came from New Haven, Conneticut, USA.
• What was Milgram’s procedure?

  • Learner (confederate) was strapped in chair and wired up with electrodes.
  • The learner had to remember pairs of words. Each time he made an error, the teacher (naive participant) delivered a stronger (fake) electric shock.
• What were the 4 prods?

  1. ‘Please continue’ or ‘Please go on’
  2. ‘The experiment requires that you continue’
  3. ‘It is absolutely essential that you continue’
  4. ‘You have no other choice, you must go on’
• What were the findings?

  • Every participant delivered shocks up to 300 volts.
  • 12.5% stopped at 300 volts and 65% continued to the highest level of 450 volts.
  • Observations include: participants showed signs of tension, many would ‘sweat, tremble, stutter, bite lip’
  • 3 had full blown uncontrollable seizures.