Agentic state

• Agentic state is a mental state where we feel no personal responsibility for our behaviour because we believe ourselves to be acting for an authoritative figure i.e as their agent. This frees us from the demands of our conscience and allows us to obey even a destructive authority figure.
• This explanation concerns the influence of others on an individual behaviour rather than the external factors in the situation.
• From his research Milgram proposed the agentic theory in which we find it easy to deny personal responsibility for our actions as we are just following orders or just doing ur job.
• Autonomous state: Individuals direct their own behaviour and take responsibilty for the consequences
• Agentic shift: People move from the autonomous state into the agentic state when confronted with an authority figure
• If we obey an order that goes against our conscience we are more likely to experience moral strain. Although people in such a situation may want to stop they may feel unable to do so due to binding factors.
• Binding factors are aspects of a situation that allow a person to minimize or ignore the damaging affects of their behaviour, which reduces the moral strain.
• Research support:

  • Hoflings study of obedience in nurses autonomous to agentic state
  • Blass and Schmitt found that people who saw Milgram's study blamed the experimenter, indicating they believed p's were agents of theory
• Criticism:

  • Alternative reasons why ppl obey an authority figure. It could be due to personality rather than the situation
  • Agency theory cannot account for why some people disobey an authority figure as shown by 1/3 of p's in Milgram's study