obedience

    Cards (27)

    • Define authority
      When a person has the power or right to give us orders
    • Define obedience
      when a person follows the direct orders of a figure of authority
    • Situational Variables That Affect Obedience
      • proximity of authority figure
      • proximity of victim
      • location
      • uniforms
    • explanations of obedience
      • legitimacy of authority
      • agency theory
      • authoritarian personality
    • legitimacy of authority [milgram]
      Because we grow up in social hierarchies, we learn from a young age to obey people who are higher up in the social hierarchy and see them as legitimate. caused by situational variables
    • Define moral strain

      When someone feels they need to obey the authority figure, but they don’t want to be responsible for the horrible consequences.
    • agency theory [milgram]
      • People obey the orders of a legitimate authority figure.
      • When people obey orders, they make an agentic shift from the autonomous state to the agentic state.
      • based on situational variables
    • Define Agentic state

      when an individual has moral strain so the make themselves an agent to the authority figure, not taking responsibility for their actions
    • Define autonomous state
      when an individual takes responsibility for their actions and holds themselves accountable
    • Define social hierarchy
      When one person in a social group has authority over the other members creating an unequal power structure
    • criticism of agency theory
      Agency theory ignores the personal characteristics that might make a person more likely to obey. [ individual/dispositional variables]
    • Authoritarian personality [ardono]

      • makes them strict, aggressive, and overly respectful of authority.
      • punish those of lower status
      • caused by overstrict parenting
      • obey due to personality traits, individual variables
    • F-scale [support for authoritarian personality]
      • high score = authoritarian personality
      • personality questionnaire
    •  criticism of Adorno’s authoritarian personality theory
      • Not everyone who obeys orders has an authoritarian personality.
    • Milgram study [findings]
      • 65% obeyed till 450V
      • 100% obeyed till 300V
      • Participants responded with signs of distress, like swearing, sweating and even seizures.
    • Milgrams study
      • The aims of Milgram’s experiments were to see if there’s something different about Germans that makes them obey, or if anyone can be made to obey.
      • To investigate these aims, he got participants to administer shocks of increasing voltage under the orders of an experimenter.
      • conducted in prestigious yale university
    • Changes milgram made to test effect of situational variables on obedience
      • when milgram changed location to a run down building obedience fell to 47.5%
      • removing authority figure from room to change proximity made obedience fall to 23%
      • changing uniform, obedience fell to 20%
      • the confederate was in the same room as the participant obedience fell to 40%
    • milgrams study [ evaluation]
      • strength ; Laboratory = more control over extraneous variables
      • weakness ; demand characteristics didn't believe it was real
      • weakness ; lack of ecological validity not representative to real life
      • weakness ; lack population validity, Results might not generalise,  androcentric bias
    • miligram unethical
      • psychological harm
      • deception ; He didn’t tell them that the learner was a confederate pretending to be shocked. He told them it was a study of learning but it was really a study of obedience
      • no informed content
      • given debrief
      • no right to withdraw
    • Evaluation of Legitimacy of Authority [strength & support]
      • Milgram’s findings that participants are more likely to obey in a respected building like a University
      • Milgram’s findings that participants were more likely to obey when the authority figure wore a uniform
    • Evaluation of Agency Theory
      • Participants experienced moral strain by showing signs of distress when following the destructive orders.
      • Participants were more likely to obey if they were further away from the victim.
      • Participants were more likely to obey when the researcher took responsibility for their actions.
    • Authoritarian Personality: Evaluation
      • Milgram’s finding that some people are more likely to obey than others.
      • the participants’ level of obedience was correlated with their score on the F-scale.
      • Not all obedience can be explained by having an authoritarian personality.
      • The theory ignores situational variables that affect obedience.
    • Resistance to Social Influence

      when an individual withstands pressure to conform and obey.
    • Define Social Support
      This is a situational explanation of resistance to social influence. when a person feels like they will have support when they resist, and other people will go along with them.
    • Locus of Control
      • the amount to which a person thinks they have control over events in their life
      • thinks they don’t have control over events in their life, they have an external locus of control
      • thinks they have control over events in their lives they have an internal locus of control
      • People with an internal locus of control are more likely to resist social influence
    • Evidence of Locus of Control
      • Locus of control can be measured through a personality questionnaire developed by Rotter.
      • Shute’s study showed that people with an internal locus of control conform less in situations that produce normative social influence.
    • What are two factors that can increase resistance to social influence?
      Social support and locus of control.
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