A01

• Define obedience

  A type of social influence whereby somebody acts in response to a direct order from a perceived authoritative figure
• State the year Milgram conducted his baseline obedience research

  1963
• State the sample used in Milgram's baseline study

  40 male volunteers
• Outline the role of the confederates in Milgram's study

  Two confederates were used in the study:

  - One was the 'experimenter' issuing the orders to the naive participant

  - One was rigged to be the 'learner
• Outline the role of the naïve participant in Milgram's study

  The naive participants were assigned the role of the 'teacher' - they tested the learner on their ability to learn word pairs; if learner got answer wrong the 'teacher' was required to issue increasingly strong electric shocks
• State the range of electric shocks

  15 volts to 450 volts
• Describe the results of Milgram's baseline experiment

  - All participants went to 300 volts

  - 65 % continued to maximum level of 450 volts
• Outline the two ways in which the participants were deceived

  1. Naive participant thought they were randomly assigned to learner and teacher, whereas it was rigged so confederate was always assigned the role of learner

  2. Naïve participant thought they were issuing real electric shocks to learner
• State one way in which Milgram addressed this deception

  He debriefed participants at end of study and sent a follow-up questionnaire
• Describe what conclusion can be drawn from this experiment

  People are willing to obey orders from an authoritative figure even if it goes against moral principles