Situational Variables

• Situational Variables

  • Things that might lead to more or less obedience
  • Proximity
  • Uniform
  • Location
• Proximity

  • Teacher and learner in the same room - obedience dropped
  • Touch proximity - teacher held learners hand on the plate - obedience dropped to 30%
  • Remote instruction - experimenter left and gave instruction by phone - obedience dropped to 20.5%
• Location

  • moved to a run down office block - obedience dropped to 47.5%
• Uniform

  • experimenter was replaced by ordinary member of the public - obedience dropped to 20%
• Strengths of the variations

  • research support - Bickman - 3 confeds dressed in different uniform - people would obey security guard
  • cross cultural replications - Deutsch
• Limitations of variations

  • low internal validity - aware procedure was fake - demand characteristics