8 - agency theory (milgram) ao3

Question 1

describe how lifton (1986) used aushwitz doctors personalities to disprove milgram’s agentic shift theory (rapid change)

Answer 1

milgram found people switched between autonomous to agentic state constantly. lifton found however in his study of german doctors in auschwitz that they used to be caring doctors and switched to being vile and brutal to prisoners by carrying out experiments on them. irreversible and gradual transition instead

Question 2

describe how there are other explanations as to why the participants in milgram’s agentic shift variation obeyed (apart from being in an agentic state)

Answer 2

the participants could have used the situation to express their sadistic impulses. supported by stanford prison experiment where the guards inflicted increasing levels of cruelty on increasingly passive prisoners. lacks internal validity?

Question 3

describe how legitimate authority serving as a basis for justifying harming others is a strength of milgram’s agentic shift variation

Answer 3

if people authorise to make judgments for participants about what is appropriate conduct then they may no longer feel that their moral values are relevant (causing them to obey).