Agency Theory: Obedience Flashcards
What is agency theory?
Agency theory was proposed by milgram, explains obedience as a pyschology process where individuals obey authority by shifting responsibility for their actions onto the authority figure
What are the two states in agency theory?
• autonomous state
• agentic state
How do you get one from state to another?
Agentic shift
What is the autonomous state?
The individual acts according to their own principles
They take full responsibility for their actions
What is the agentic state?
An individual who carries out orders from an authority figure
Even if they conflict with our personal sense of right and wrong
Responsibility is shifted onto the authority figure
What is agentic shift?
The switch between the autonomous state and the agenetic state that occurs when confronted by someone seen as a legitimate authority figure
Allow them to control our behaviour
What is moral strain?
This is experienced when people are asked to do something by an authority figure that they would not choose to do themselves
There is tension when the individual contemplates what to do as a result they will fell uncomfortable
Extreme circumstances - anxious and distressed
How can you end moral strain?
• displace the responsibility of the situation onto the authority figure - clears them of the consequences of their actions
• relieved through dissent to authority - the individual has removed themselves from the situation
What is the organisation of human society?
• Evolution and survival
• Social organisation and obedience
Nature
So how do people know to be obedient?
Primary socialisation
- Family
- aged 0 - 5
Secondary socialisation
- Education
- Legal systems
What is nature?
Innate preparedness
All humans are born with the capacity for language, in a similar way we are in innately prepared to be obedient (it is passed on genetically)
What is nurture?
Socialisation
Our upbringing an exposure to authority figures nurture this preparedness
Learn upbringing, environment
EVIDENCE
A strength is that it is supported by Milgram’s 1963 study
This provides evidence for agency theory as the participant showed overt signs of moral strain when given an order. Wendy debriefed, many reported that their behaviour was the responsibility of the experimenter and that they had not wanted to do it.
This proves evidence for the concept of displacement of responsibility within the agentic state
CA
Perry 2012 question the internal validity of this evidence that the participant saw through the deception.
Evidence from Yale university archives reveals participants questioned whether the shocks were real
APPLICATION
The theory can be used to explain real life events where destructive obedience took place e.g My Lai massacre during the Vietnam war - a lieutenant instructed his division to enter and shoot all occupants
The lieutenant justified himself was just following orders which offers some support for agency theory involving a displacement of responsibility
SHORTCOMINGS AND STRENGTHS
Individual differences
Weakness, it does not explain individual differences – why some people obey and others do not. Disobedience can occur for many reasons such as personality type or situation, obedience is a more complex process than is being explained by agency theory.
Scientific status
Concepts of autonomy and agency are very difficult to define and measure. An internal mental process that can’t be directly measured.
Nature and nurture
The theory does take into account the role of both nature and nurture
E.g the development of hierarchies and obedience to authority figures indicates that there are evolutionary mechanisms behind obedience
