obedience - milgram

• obedience:

  • social influence in direct response to order from another person
• adolf eichmann:

  • head of nazi's gestapos department for jewish affairs
  • brought to trial + claimed he was just obeying orders
• milgrams aim:

  • investigate whether in certain circumstances a normal person would give somebody a potentially lethal electric shock if told to do so by an authority figure
• milgrams procedure pt 1:

  • Yale university, 40 male volunteers
  • participant = teacher, confederates = learner + experimenter
  • deceived about aim of study
  • required to give fake electric shock of increasing voltage (15-450V) each time learner made mistake
• milgrams procedure pt 2:

  • teacher given small shock beforehand to believe shocks were real
  • switches labelled slight shock - severe shock
  • heard pre recorded cries of distress, from 315V learner gave no response
  • experimenter gave orders to continue
• Milgram's findings:

  • 100% = 300V
  • 65% = went up to 450V
  • 12.5% = stopped at 300V
• milgram's additional findings:

  • participants showed signs of tension, 3 had full blown uncontrollable seizures
  • predicted that 3% would continue to 450V
  • debrief = 84% were glad to have participated
• milgram's conclusion:

  • ordinary people extremely obedient to authority - even when asked to behave in inhumane manner
  • not evil people that commit atrocities but people that obey orders
• EVALUATION: broke ethical guidelines

  • deceived = study on how punishment affects learning + role allocation
  • werent protected from psychological harm, continued to feel guilty following experiment
  • breaches could damage reputation of psychology + jeopardise future research
• EVALUATION: lack of internal validity

  • Orne + Holland - didnt believe in setup , despite cries, experimenter remained cool and distant, leading to believe learner wasnt suffering
  • Perry listened to tapes - many expressed doubts about reality of shocks
  • not behaving naturally, wasnt testing what he said he was testing - lowers internal validity
• EVALUATION: good external validity

  • relationship between authority + participant accurately represented real life
  • Hofling et al - nurses in hospital ward, high levels of obedience to unjustified demands by doctors (21/22 obeyed)
  • findings can be generalised to other situations, giving valuable info about obedience in real life