Situational Explanations of Obedience

• Proximity

  • How close you are to someone or something
  • How close teacher was to learner, how close teacher was to experimenter
  • Teacher and learner were seated in same room 
  • Dropped to 40% 
  • Able to understand learner’s pain more directly
  • Experimenter left room and gave instructions over phone
  • Obedience levels fell to 20.5%
  • Teacher forces hand onto shock plate
  • 30%
  • Harder to see consequences of actions
  • Lower moral strain
  • Feel anguish more directly
• Location

  • Conducted initial research in Yale University
  • Conducted variation in rundown building in Bridgeport
  • Obedience dropped from 65% to 47.5% (administered full voltage)
  • Prestigious location has importance in generating respect and therefore obedience
  • Legitimacy
  • Integrity
• Uniform

  • Wore white grey lab coat 
  • Easily recognisable 
  • Conveys power and authority
  • Symbolic power
  • Variation
  • Experimenter called away and replaced by ordinary member of public in plain clothes - confederate
  • Dropped to 20% administering the full 450v
• Evaluation Point 1: Strength: Research Support

  Research Support

  Bickman - collect rubbish 

  Milkman - 14%

  Suit - 19%

  Uniform - 38%

  Applicable in both lab setting and real world
• Evaluation Point 2: Weakness: Obedience Alibi

  Obedience alibi

  David Mandel (1998) who argues that it offers an excuse or 'alibi' for evil behaviour. 

  Offensive to survivors of the Holocaust to suggest that the Nazis were simply obeying orders and were victims themselves of situational factors beyond their control.

  Personality factors
• Evaluation Point 3: Weakness: Demand Characteristics

  Demand characteristics

  E.g proximity - very good actors 

  Very likely to show demand characteristics - extremely low ecological validity

  Lacks external validity 
• Evaluation Point 3: Counter: Systematically changing one variable

  • Systematically changing one variable
  • High reliability
  • Standardised methods, with variables being kept as consistent as possible.
  • 1,000 participants took part
  • Weight of evidence
• Evaluation Point 4: Strength: Cross=Cultural

  Cross-cultural replications

  Miranda et al. (1981) found an obedience rate of over 90% amongst Spanish students. 

  This suggests that Milgram's conclusions about obedience are not limited to American males, but are valid across cultures and apply to females too.

  Results can be generalised