Explanations for obedience Flashcards
What are situational (situation) explanations for obedience?
-Agentic State
-Legitimacy of Authority
Why are people in the agentic state more likely to obey authority?
Because they feel no personal responsibility for their behaviour because they believe they are acting on behalf of the authority figure.
Define the autonomous state.
When a person takes full responsibility for their behaviours and actions.
What is the agentic shift?
Changing from being in an autonomous state to an agentic state.
Explain legitimacy of authority.
We are more likely to obey people who we perceive to have authority over us.
Evaluate situational explanations.
+Supporting evidence from Milgram for the agentic shift
When the teacher is acting on behalf of the experimenter, obedience increased to 65%. Pps clearly show agentic state.
In the telephone variation, obedience reduced because pps are in the autonomous state and take full responsibility.
+Agentic state can explain real life obedience.
Nazi soldier said he was ‘just following orders’, showing he was in the agentic state and obeying someone who was a higher rank than himself.
+Research support for legitimacy of authority.
Bickman found that obedience was higher when dressed as a security guard (92%) compared to normal clothes (58%).
What is a dispositional (personality) explanation of obedience?
The Authoritarian Personality.
Why are people with an authoritarian personality more likely to obey?
They have developed traits which makes a person more likely to be obedient.
What is the authoritarian personality?
A person who has extreme respect for authority and it obedient to those who have power over them.
What are characteristics of the authoritarian personality?
-Awareness of peoples status’ and show excessive respect for people above them.
-Highly conformist, dogmatic (forceful).
Evaluate the authoritarian personality.
+Supporting research from the f-scale from Adorno. People who scored higher had strong authoritarian traits.
-Limitation, it has methodological issues. It is dated and therefore lacks temporal validity. It is a ‘child of it’s time’.
+Supporting evidence from Milgram. Those who obeyed and went to the full 450V, scored higher on the authoritarianism tests.
