Obedience Social Psychology

• Where was the original experiment held ?

  basement Of Yale University
• How many participants were involved and their age and gender ?

  40 males participants, ages 20 to 50 years old
• The participants were all from the new haven area
• What did milgram tell participants they were in the experiment for ?

  To investiagte the effects of punishment on learning
• milgram gave participants a real 45 v shock to prove it was real
• Milgrams voltage machine went up to 450 v
• Participants were played standardised voice recordings to ensure they had the same experience
• there was a teacher, a learner and a experimenter
• The laboratory was a artificial setting which may have affected the results and findings
• there was visible distress from most participants, and 3 had stress - induced seizures
• B P S and A P A provide ethical laws which psychological researchers must adhere to, to ensure psychological status, reputation and credibility
• ' fully informed consent ' was justifiably broken to prevent demand characteristics
• He did not break ' debrief ' guideline as he told them fully at the end of the experiment
• He broke the ' deception ' guideline justifiably as it was needed for validity
• ' right to withdraw ' was broken as he did not make it clear that participants could leave, due to the prompts he used
• ' protection of participants ' was broken as there was more harm than ordinary life - 3 stress - induced seizures and visible distress
• Was his experiment generalisable ?

  No - we cannot generalise to suggest that females obey to the same extent
• Was his experiment / results reliable ?

  Yes - there was standardised procedures, which suggests that his results are less likely to be affected by anomalies
• Was his experiment / results useful ?

  yes - helps understand that people could harm based on authority
• Was his experiment / results valid ?

  Internal validity - not ecological validity ( unrealistic setting , so obedience levels are unrepresentative )
• Was his experiment / results ethical ?

  Yes and No - there was visible distress and 3 stress - induced seizures but some is justified due to demand characteristics
• What percentage of participants went to 300 v ?

  100
• What percentage of participants went to 450v ?

  65
• What percentage of participants fully believed in the experiment sent in the questionnaire a year after the experiment was conducted ?


  56.1