Explanations for Obedience Flashcards
What are the dispositional explanations for obedience?
Authoritarian personality
What are the non dispositional explanations?
Situational factors, (proximity, location and uniform) Agentic state, perception of legitimate authority
What did Milgram find with regards to teacher- learner proximity in his variations?
Milgram increased proximity of teacher and learner in 2 of his variations. In one the teacher and the learner were in the same room about 46cm apart (obedience rate 40% up to 450 volts). In another the teacher had to place the learners hand on the shock plate (obedience rate 30% up to 450 volts). Increasing the proximity also serves to remove buffers.
What did Milgram find in terms of location in his run down office variation?
Participants from first experiment claimed that they had continued delivering shocks as research was being conducted at Yale university. The run down office variation saw obedience rates of participants shocking up to 450 volts at 48%
What did other researchers find with regards to the impact of uniform on obedience?
3 male experimenters gave orders to 153 randomly selected pedestrians.
Experimenters were dressed in one of three ways: a jacket and a tie, a milkmans uniform, a guards uniform that looked like a police officer.
Bickman found that when the experimenter was dressed as a guard participants were more likely to obey than if he was dressed as a milk man or in a jacket and tie.
92% of people complied to the request to lend money when asked by experimenter in guards uniform compared to 49% when in ordinary clothes.
What are the findings from bushman’s study regarding uniform?
70% complied when woman was wearing a uniform compared to 58% when she was wearing ordinary smart clothes.
What is legitimacy of authority?
Refers to the degree of social power held by the person who gives the order.
Social power may be associated with social roles or with social status.
What did Hofling et al find with regards to legitimate authority?
21 out of 22 nurses complied unhesitatingly.
11 later said that they had not noticed the dosage discrepancy
What did milgram’s agency theory suggest?
that individuals oprate at 2 levels in social situations.
What is the agentic state?
the individual sees themselves as an agent of another and carries out their orders without accepting personal responsibility for their actions. they see the person giving the orders as responsible not themselves
What is the autonomous state?
the individual is aware of the consequences of their actions and choose voluntarily to behave in particular ways accepting responsibility for their behaviour
What is agentic shift?
refers to the switch from operating in the autonomous state to the agentic state. Agentic shift is therefore more likely when there is perception of legitimate authority
