Milgrams study

• What is obedience


  A type of social influence, complying with the demands of an authority figure
• what was the aim of milgrams study


  to investigate what could lead ordinary people to show obedience to authority figures and inflict harm on others and discover the situational factors that cause people to obey
• what were the methods for milgrams study


  40 male volunteers

  paid 4 dollars

  advertised in the newspaper

  they were told it was a study on punishment on memory.

  participant was teacher, confederate was learner.

  teacher gave shock for every wrong answer

  confed was strapped into chair

  switches and generator was in teachers room

  15 to 450

  comments were above switches

  teacher was told to give switches and had no doubt they’d hurt increasingly

  respnses were recorded

  learner bangs on wall at 300

  researcher said please continue and it’s absolutely essential you must continue
• What were the results for milgrams study


  65% went to 450V, 100% went to 300V
• what was the conclusion to milgrams study


  obedience to authority is due more to situational factors than their personality. people lose morality, empathy and compassion when being blindly obedient
• what were the features that cause obedience in milgrams study

  prestigious university (Yale)

  worth to learn about memory!

  the victim wasn’t unwilling

  participant felt obligated

  it’s a new situation for them

  believed the shock was dangerous but not painful
• Zimbardo's Stanford prison experiment was criticised as it lacked ecological validity (the situation was artificial), the prisoners were paid which could affect their behaviour and Zimbardo had to end the experiment early due to safety concerns
• What were the results of milgrams study


  65% of participants went to 450v and 100% went to 300
• whats the conclusion for milgrams study


  obedience to authority is due to more situational factors than their personality. people lose feelings like empathy, compassion and morality and are inclined towards blind obedience/
• what are the features that cause obedience

  prestigious university like yale

  its worth studying about memory

  victims were not unwilling

  participant was paid and felt obliged

  new situation

  believed that the shock was dangerous but not painful
• What were the situational variables in milgrams study, explain


  proximity: physical closeness of authority figure and person they're giving orders to

  location: the place the order is given in

  uniform: authority figure usually has a uniform
• describe the proximity variable


  • Teacher and learner sat in the same room, obedience dropped from 65 to 40%
  • in some variations teacher had to put learners hand on the electric shock plate, obedience dropped from 40 to 30%
  • last variation, he gave telephonic instructions obedience was further dropped to 20.5%
• Describe location variable


  • Moved from yale to bridgeport
  • obedience dropped from 65 to 47.5%
• decribe the uniform variable


  • the experimenter wore a lab coat and left the room
  • a man in ordinary uniform who was supposed to be recording the times decided to start giving out instructions and obedience decreased to 20% from 65%
• Who was Bickman and what did he do


  wanted to know if uniform had an impact on obedience.

  he made someone dress with a jacket and a tie, then a milkman, then a security guard.

  people obey 2x more when the research assistant was dressed in a security guard
• What are the 2 strength evaluations of milgrams study


  cross cultural replications:

  • Miranda found out 90% more obedience amongst Spanish people so it was just restricted to American males but can also be applied to females. HOWEVER researchers said replications only happens in western cultures
  • Milgrams research can be replicated:
  • a game show was hosted by jen la mort and fake shocks were given by participants and 80% obeyed to give max shock.
• what are two weaknesses of milgrams study

  Lack of internal validity:

  • participants has worked out the procedure was fake, but went along anyway
  • Even more so because of the extreme manipulation, for example the ordinary man dressed in casual clothes was very fake.
  • participants saw through the deception

  Participants didn't know the aim of the study so they ere deceived and milgram broke ethical guidelines but the participants were contacted a year later
• what's the obedience alibi


  a criticism of Milgram's study is that it provides an obedience alibi for those that have carried out destructive orders
• what are the three different types of observations

  naturalistic observation:

  setting or context where behavior would usually occur, its easier to study behavior there because its natural, this observation has high external validity but there's a lack of control in extraneous variables

  controlled observations:

  strange situation, watching behavior in a controlled environment, it involves manipulating variables to observe effects and controls for extraneous variables, lacks ecological validity

  covert observation:

  nobody knows they're being watched natural but ethical issues, increased validity.
• whst overt observation

  participants are being watched with consent, no ethical issues but may have demand characteristics
• what are the explanations of obedience

  situational: features of the situation that affect obedience like proximity, location and uniform

  psychological: where obedience occurs as a result of ones mental state or perception of authority figure

  dispositional factors: personals personality affects obedience called internal explanations
• whats milgrams agency theory


  • proposed the agentic state and agency theory as explanations for obedience
  • argues that we are social from an early age and we learn to obey from authority figures like parents and obedience is crucial to keep society functioning.
• whats the agentic state


  loss of free will, its a mental state where independence is lost and free will, conscience are suppressed as we surrender her free will because we act as an agent for the authority figure, we see ourselves as primarily the agents to the authority figure and then our selves as individuals secondarily.

  Milgram believes we are socialized into the agentic state from a young age.

  we receive moral strain which means that we feel consequences of going against our conscience and doing something you know is wrong
• whats the autonomous state


  a mental state where we have free will and are independent and our thinking is autonomous.
• what type of ranking system is the agency theory seen as


  hierarchical social systems and people have different ranks
• how will an individual act if someone is a higher rank than them in the hierarchical social system


  They will act as an agent to the person because they see them as an authority figure
• explain legitimacy of authority figures


  • some people hold legitimate authority and symbols of legitimate authority can be a police badge, a uniform or id badge
  • a consequence of this is hat authority figures can be granted power to punish other and most people accept this
• What are the evaluations for the agency theory


  research evidence: supports that legitimate authority can be the cause of obedience

  Blass and Schmitt: showed a film of Milgram's study and asked students who was responsible and they said the experimenter

  limited: doesn't explain why participants didn't obey

  cross-cultural differences: countries differ in levels of obedience, killhamand mann 1974 replicated milgrams study in australia and only 16% did 450V, mantel did this in germany and 85% obeyed
• what does psychological explanations for obedience mean


  obedience occurs as a result of a persons mental state or perception of the authority figure