Contemporary Study: Burger 2009 Flashcards
What did burger want to do?
Would people obey today? Or are people more aware of the dangers?
Burger wanted to replicate Milgrim‘s experiment to see if he was right
He wanted to adhere to current ethical guidelines so the maximum shock level in his experiment is going to be 150 V in order to minimise participant distress
What was burgers aim?
To see whether obedience is affected by gender as well as the personality traits ‘ empathetic concern’ and ‘ desire for personal control’
What type of experiment was procedure one?
Lab experiment
Independent groups design
How did burger recruit participants?
- Burger used to self selecting (volunteer) sample
- People respond responded (by telephone or email) to advertisements and flyers in local newspapers and local establishments ( e.g libraries)
How did burger follow ethical guidelines?
- stopped the shocks at 150 V to avoid high levels of anxiety
- A two step screening process excluded volunteers who might have had a negative reaction to the experience
- Participants were given three reminders (twice in writing) of their right to withdraw
- A real but very mild 15 V shock was given to participants to start (compared to Milgram’s 45 V)
- Participants were debriefed almost immediately after the study ended. They met the actor who played the learner and we told the shocks were not real.
- A clinical psychologist supervised all trials and was told to end trial immediately if anyone appeared exclusively distressed
What is empathetic concern?
The tendency to experience feelings of sympathy and compassion for unfortunate others
What is the desire for personal control?
How motivated a person is to see themselves in control of events in their lives
What did screening one process consist of?
Telephone call from a research assistant
-Asked if they had been to college, if so had they taken any psychology classes?
Screen out individuals who may know Milgram’s experiment
People who had taken more than two classes were excluded
- Six questions created by two clinical psychologists
The research assistant excluded anyone who would not be mentally fit enough to take part
What did screening to process consist of?
At the Santa Clara University campus
-Participants were given a series of scales to complete
Demographic sheet asking about age, occupation, education and ethnicity and other questionnaires assessing anxiety/depression, empathy, and desire for control
-Interviewed by a licensed clinical psychologist
Excluded anyone who would have a negative reaction
Who did the final participants consist of?
- 70 adults : 29 men, 41 women
- Aged 20 - 81 …. Mean age of 42.9
- 60% had university degrees
- 50% white, 4% black Afro-American
When did the trial end for procedure 1?
The researcher recorded the final shock administered and terminated the trial either when the participant refused to continue, after hearing all four prods or when they administered 150 V
What are the results of procedure 1 in burgers experiment?
- 70% of participants went to 150 V
- No significant difference between men and women, women were more likely to press 150 V (72.7%) compared to man (66.7%)
- However defiant participants had higher scores on the desire to be in control compared to obedient participants
What was procedure to in burgers experiment?
This broadly follows the same procedure as the baseline condition but uses two confederates
What happened in procedure two of burgers experiment?
- at 75 V teacher one hesitated after hearing the learner grunt
- at 90 V teacher one says I don’t know about this. They are prompted by the experimenter but they refuse to carry on and push their chair back from the table.
- The experiment tells teacher two to continue with the experiment
- if they continue then the experiment is ended at 150 V ( as in the baseline above)
What are the results of both procedures?
Experiment 1 - baseline
Stopped at 150 volts or earlier
Males - 6
Females - 6
Total - 12
Went to continue after 150 volts
Males - 12
Females - 16
Total - 28 (70%)
Experiment 2 - modelled refusal condition
Stopped at 150 volts or earlier
Males - 5
Females - 6
Total - 11
Went to continue after 150 V
Males - 6
Females - 13
Total - 19 (63%)
What can we conclude from burgers results?
- Milgram’s findings were not era-bound nor are they androcentric
- lack of empathy does not seem to be a valid explanation
- desire for personal controls seem to determine the likelihood of defiance
GENERALISIBILITY
The generalisability of this study can be said to be better than Milgrim as he gathered a diverse sample of ages and ethnicities, so the study has greater generalisability. This means that destructive obedience in a range of individuals could be measured.
CA
The sample was still voluntary and so this could well mean that people with similar personality characteristics may call to do the study and so therefore the sample maybe be more willing to obey
The sample may not be representative of the target population
-pre-study screening was excellent ethically
Final sample may have been more psychologically robust
RELIABILITY
The study is highly standardised
This means that the study had internal reliability as it was very controlled and the method could be used by other psychologist to test the relevance of the findings overtime
E.g comparing against Milgram
APPLICATION
Elms 2009 claims that burgers research tells us little about real world obedience and thus lacks application
Participants were stopped before they suffered any real tension or dissonance about what they were doing
