Obedience

• Zimbardo prison study procedure : mock prison set up in a basement, 21 emotionally stable male students were selected, randomly assigned prisoner and guard and encouraged to behave like their social roles, wore uniform to represent their social roles
• Zimbardo findings : guards took roles enthusiastically, after 2 days prisoners rebelled, guards harassed prisoners and played them off each other, prisoner released due to symptoms of psychological disturbance, 2 more released on 4th day, one prisoner went on hunger strike, guards became brutal and enjoyed their power, study ended after 6 days instead of 14
• Zimbardo conclusions : social roles seem to have a strong influence on behaviour, guards became brutal and prisoners submissive, roles taken on easily, and behaved as if they were in a prison
• Zimbardo's aim - to know why prison guards behave so brutally, was it because they have sadistic personalities or was it their social role that created such behaviour?
• Zimbardo's strengths : 1. high internal validity as they controlled variables 2. realism (90% of conversations about prison life between prisoners) 3. individual personality doesn't impact results as only emotionally stable men selected 4. generalisable as guards had same level of control as real guards
• Zimbardo limitations : 1. demand characteristics 2. exaggeration of social roles minimised influence of dispositional factors 3. not ecologically valid
• In Zimbardo's study participants weren't fully told about nature of study so didn't give fully informed consent

  Defence - participants chose to act brutal and it added to realism
• In Zimbardo's study participants weren't told they couldn't leave (deception)

  Defence - adds to realism and he said they could leave but there was a misunderstanding
• In Zimbardo's study participants weren't given the right to withdraw

  Defence - let 4 participants leave early
• During Zimbardo's study the prisoners weren't protected from harm and the study didn't immediately shut down when the prisoners started experiencing physical and psychological harm

  Defence - wanted to study behaviour and ended study early, sent emotionally stable men, played a role in the study so could oversee the participants
• Obedience is following direct instructions from an individual to avoid conflict
• Milgram's aim - to test the "Germans are different" hypothesis that states Germans have a basic character deficit which means they have a readiness to obey people in command
• "Germans are different" is an example of a dispositional explanation as its arguing the cause of behaviour results from the persons own personality and characteristics
• Milgram argued people would commit atrocities if required to do so by an authority figure, an example of a situational explanation as it argues that behaviour resulted from the situation a person was in
• Milgram selected participants by advertising for male participants to take part in a study at Yale University
• Milgram got 40 male participants and put 1 in each study
• Milgram's procedures involved participants being paired and told they were taking part in a study of memory.
• In Milgram's procedures, the participants were put into a rigged draw to decide who was a "learner" and who was a "teacher".
• Participants in Milgram's procedures were told they were to administer an increasing shock up to 450V shock to a learner who had made a mistake.
• Teachers in Milgram's procedures had to read out pairs of words for the learner to remember.
• Participants in Milgram's procedures were told that the learner was in pain and that they were to continue the shock until the learner said that he could not take anymore.
• If a teacher wanted to stop in Milgram's procedures, they were prodded to continue.
• Prod 2 in Milgram's procedure was : "The experiment requires that you continue"
• Milgram predicted 2% of people would shock the lethal 450V and most people would quit early. It was found that 100% of participants shocked up to 300V and 65% shocked up to 450V
• Milgram's conclusion - people will obey under stress and certain situations, especially when people giving instructions are perceived to be figures of authority
• Criticisms of Milgram's study include that it lacks experimental validity as participants couldn't believe they were giving real shocks, unethical and the sample was unrepresentative of other populations as he only used white male Americans.
• Strengths of Milgram's study include 70% of participants saying they believed they were giving real shocks, ethical guidelines introduced due to his experiment, study replicated in other cultures with similar results but collectivist cultures were more likely to obey
• In the puppy love study, 75% of participants delivered the maximum shock, all females delivered maximum shock whereas only 54% of males did.
• What happened in the Milgram study variation of proximity if the teacher and learner were in the same room?

  Obedience dropped from 65% to 40%
• What happened in the Milgram study variation of proximity if the teacher forced the leaners hand onto the plate?

  Obedience dropped to 30%
• In remote instruction variation of Milgram's study, experimenter left the room and delivered instructions via phone, obedience dropped to 20.5%
• Decreased proximity allows people to psychologically distance themselves from their actions
• What happened when Milgram conducted the same experiment in a run down office block?

  Obedience dropped to 47.5% as the university gave the experiment legitimacy and authority
• What were the 3 variations of Milgram's study?

  1. Proximity
  2. Uniform
  3. Location
• In the baseline study (Milgram's) the experimenter wore a lab coat, in the variation they wore everyday clothes.

  Obedience dropped to 20% as uniforms encourage obedience as they are symbols of legitimate authority, lowest of variations
• In Australia female students obeyed with a 16% rate so they are less obedient than Germany whose male population obeyed with a rate of 85% strength of legitimacy of authority as explains cultural difference related to structure of society
• Situational explanations mean behaviour in terms of aspects of the environment
• Milgram proposed the agentic theory to explain why people obey orders even when these go against their conscience and suggested people can exist in 2 states:

  Autonomous state

  Agentic state
• Define autonomous state

  We act according to our own moral values and feel responsible for our actions
• Define agentic state

  Acting according to orders given by an authority figure, we see ourselves as agents of others and don't feel responsible for our actions