Milgram

• The aim of Milgram’s study was to investigate if people would obey orders from authority, even if it could cause harm to another person
• The shock generator gave shocks from 15 to 450 volts.
• The sample in Milgram’s study was: 40 American men from New Haven. They were all aged between 20 to 50 years and were from a broad range of occupations. The study was conducted at Yale University.
• The participant was always assigned the role of teacher by using a rigged drawing system.
• The confederate (actor) played the learner who was strapped into an electric chair with electrodes attached to their arm.
• The experimenter wore a white lab coat and spoke and behaved in an authoritative manner throughout the experiment.
• The experimenter gave standardized verbal prods that had a set order when participants protested. They were given as follows:

  Please continue

  Please go on

  The experiment requires you to continue

  It is absolutely essential that you continue

  You have no choice, you must go on
• At 300 and 315 volts, the confederate bangs at the wall in protest. After this, no answer is given on the memory test and the confederate makes no more noises.
• The shock generator had several labels in the following order: slight, moderate, strong, very strong, intense, extreme intensity, danger severe and XXX. Each shock given went up by 15 volts each time.
• Participants were paid $4.50 for participating. They were told it was a study about memory and learning. All participants were recruited via a newspaper advertisement. It was a volunteer sample.
• Participants were instructed by the experimenter to increase the voltage with every wrong answer until the maximum level of 450 volts was reached.
• 5, 8, 1, 26 is the number of participants that went up to maximum voltage.
• After the experiment, participants showed visible signs of relief.
• One conclusion Milgram made was that people are far more likely to obey an authority figure than expected.
• Another conclusion of this study stated:

  Despite the high levels of obedience, participants still found it stressful to carry out destructive orders due to the interactions of 2 social phenomenas which are the need to avoid harming others and the need to follow orders from an authority figure.
• Factors increasing obedience level included the perceived legitimacy of the study, and the obligation to continue as they were being paid to participate.
• After the experiment, the deception was fully explained and participants were interviewed. In this interview, they were asked to rank how painful they thought the 450 volt shock was on a scale of 0-14. The mean value calculated was 13.42, showing that participants genuinely believed that they were causing serious pain.
• The research method of this study was a controlled observation, as no IVs were present and the experiment was done in a laboratory. Participants’ physical behavior and any verbal comments were recorded through a one way mirror.