Explanations For Obedience

Question 1

What does agentic state mean?

Answer 1

• This is where the individual is acting on behalf of someone else. The individual feels that they have diminished personal responsibility and therefore do not feel guilty about their actions because they are agents of others, usually of higher status.

Question 2

What does autonomous state mean?

Answer 2

• The individual assumes full responsibility for their behaviours and actions. An individual’s behaviour is guided by their own values, beliefs and principles.

Question 3

Research support for agentic state

Answer 3

Milgram found that obedience rates reduced to 20.5% when an instruction to the Teacher to give an electric shock was given over a telephone, rather than them being in the same room as the Experimenter. This can be explained by the agentic shift because in the original experiment the Teacher is acting on behalf of the Experimenter, and the Teacher mindlessly accepts an order. We see that the obedience rate is 65% and participants clearly displaying an agentic state, where they can pass the responsibility to the Experimenter and they believe that they won’t be held responsible for their own actions. In the variation with the telephone, obedience is lower because the participant is now in the autonomous state, where there is high personal responsibility for their actions and their own principles guide their decisions. This means that when we are acting as an agent for someone, we are able to diffuse the responsibility. This results in increased obedience.

Question 4

Real life example of the agentic state?

Answer 4

Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi commander who was responsible for the genocide of millions in concentration camps, stood trial for his crimes after the Second World War ended. His defence was that he was simply ‘only following orders’ – that he saw himself in the agentic state, obeying someone who was a higher-ranked than himself. Although Eichmann was eventually executed for the role he played in the Holocaust, this shows that the defence can be, and is used by those who have committed crimes.

Question 5

What is meant by legitimacy of authority

Answer 5

amount of perceived social power that is held by the person giving instructions. In society there is a hierarchy, and we are socialised to obey the orders of individuals that society has given the right to demand obedience, for example teachers, doctors, police officers and parents.

Question 6

Research supporting legitimacy of authority.

Answer 6

Milgram’s original laboratory experiment involved using a confederate who played the role of the Experimenter. In order to create a sense of legitimacy, the Experimenter wore a white lab coat which signalled status and authority to the real participants. Obedience was high (65%) which suggest that the perceived legitimacy of the Experimenter had an effect on the real participant’s obedience levels.

, Bickman (1974) carried out a field experiment in New York in which he asked passers-by to complete tasks such as picking up rubbish or lending money to a stranger for a parking meter. In one condition, when the experimenter was dressed as a security guard, 82% of participants obeyed the request to lend money, due to the legitimacy the uniform portrayed. In another condition, the experimenter wore normal clothes and 36% obeyed the request. Demonstrating how important the uniform can be in changing obedience rates. Therefore, obedience is likely to increase if the person giving the orders is perceived to have legitimate authority.

Question 7

Why is cultural differences a strength for legitimacy of authority?

Answer 7

Many studies show that countries differ in the degree to which people are traditionally obedient to authority. For example, Kilham and Mann (1974) replicated Milgram’s procedure in Australia and found that only 16% of their participants went all the way to the top of the voltage scale. On the other hand, Mantell (1971) found a very different figure for German participants-85%. This shows in some cultures, authority is more likely to be accepted as legitimate and entitled to demand obedience from individuals. This reflects the ways different societies are structured and how children are raised to perceive authority figures. Such supportive findings from cross-cultural research increases the validity of the explanation.

Question 8

What is a limitation of agentic state and legitimacy of authority ?

Answer 8

that they do not consider other factors which can influence obedience levels. There are also dispositional factors that can influence obedience levels, such as the individual having specific authoritarian traits. In addition to this, situational variables such as proximity can also explain why people obey authority figures. This is a limitation as the situational explanations of obedience fail to acknowledge the complexity of factors affecting obedience such as an individual’s personality. (NOTE this can be used to evaluate agentic state and legitimacy of authority)

Question 9

Summarise the authoritarian personality as a dispositional explanation of obedience.

Answer 9

suggests that an individual has a collection of traits (or dispositions) that have evolved as their personality has developed throughout their childhood, possibly due to strict parenting. This means that obedience is due to an individual’s personality not the situation.
• People with an authoritarian personality identify with ‘strong’ people. They show dislike for people they perceive as having a lower social status and are generally hostile towards those who were ‘weak’.
• They are hyper-conscious of their own and others’ status, showing excessive respect for those who were in positions of authority above them. They are likely to be obedient and submissive towards people of perceived higher status because they believe in absolute obedience towards authority.
• They are likely to be highly conformist, conventional and dogmatic (strong expression of opinions, as if facts).

Question 10

Research support for authoritarian personality.

Answer 10

Adorno et al (1950) who developed 9 dimensions (scales), including the “ F-scale”

The F-scale involved the participants rating their agreement with each item on a 6-point scale from “disagree strongly” to “agree strongly”. Adorno found that people who scored highly on the F-scale (strong authoritarian traits) identified with “strong” people and were hostile to the “weak”. There was also a strong positive correlation between authoritarianism and prejudice. He also found that those with authoritarian personality types had a cognitive style where there was no fuzziness between categories of people, with fixed stereotypes about other groups. This provides support to the theory that those with an authoritarian personality have a tendency to be highly obedient to authority.

Question 11

What is other research support for authoritarian personality?

Answer 11

Milgram and Elms (1966) who conducted interviews with a sample of participants from Milgram’s study believing that there might be a link between obedience and authoritarianism. The questions in the interview were designed to measure the authoritarian personality. He found that those who were fully obedient and went to 450V scored higher on tests of authoritarianism (e.g. scored highly on the F-scale) than those who defied the experimenter.

In addition to this, Zillmer et al (1995) reported that sixteen Nazi war criminals scored highly on three of the F-scale dimensions. Together with Adorno, this provides reliable support to the theory that an authoritarian personality increases obedience. This supports the idea of a link between authoritarian personality type and obedience.

Question 12

What is a methodological criticism of the authoritarian personality ?

Answer 12

Adorno and his colleagues measured a range of variables and found many significant correlations between them. However, no matter how strong a correlation between two variables might be, this does not mean that one causes the other. Therefore, although authoritarianism and obedience may be linked, the link is limited and we cannot conclude that an authoritarian personality causes high level of obedience. This means that this link is only correlational so this makes it impossible to draw the conclusion that an authoritarian personality causes obedience, just that there is a relationship.

Question 13

What is a limitation of this dispositional explanation?

Answer 13

Over simplistic

by assuming that a correlation provides empirical evidence for cause and effect. In adopting these assumptions, the dispositional explanation ignores the impact of other factors such as the level of education that the individual has experienced. Middendorp and Meloen, (1990) have found that less-educated people are consistently more authoritarian than the well-educated people are and Milgram also found reliable support for this. This suggests that authoritarianism is only one factor and that there are a number of inter-connected factors and variables that may determine authoritarianism and obedience. Further to this there are a number of situational variables (Proximity, Location, and Uniform) which might be important in situations where there is high obedience. This suggests that we should take a more holistic view when trying to explain obedience and this holistic view should acknowledge both situational and dispositional factors.

Question 14

Summarise locus of control as a dispositional explanation for resistance .

Answer 14

Rotter (1966) proposed the idea of locus of control, which is the extent to which people believe they have control over their own lives.

Rotter proposes that the individuals with an internal locus of control would be better at resisting social pressures (such as the need to conform or obey) as they feel in control of situations. They feel they take personal responsibility for their actions and experiences and they make decisions based on their own beliefs.

People with an external locus of control believe that what happens to them is controlled by external factors such as luck or fate. Individuals with an external locus of control are more likely to conform and obey as they feel that they do not have complete control over their life. They believe that things turn out a certain way regardless of their actions as so are less able to resist social influence.

Question 15

Supporting evidence for locus of control from obedience research.

Answer 15

Oliner & Oliner (1998) interviewed non-Jewish survivors of WWII, and compared those who had resisted orders, and protected Jewish people from the Nazi’s, to those who had not. Oliner and Oliner found that the ‘rescuers’, who had resisted orders, were more likely to have an internal locus of control, than the 126 people who had simply followed orders. These results therefore appear to support the idea that an internal locus of control makes individuals less likely to follow orders and obey (remain independent).

Question 16

Supporting evidence for LOC from conformity research

Answer 16

. Spector (1983) used Rotter’s locus of control scale to determine whether locus of control is associated with conformity. From 157 students, Spector found that individuals with an internal locus of control were less likely to conform than those with an external locus of control. However, this was only in situations of normative social influence, where individuals conform to be accepted. There was no difference between the two groups for informational social influence. This suggests that locus of control is more influential when conforming due to Normative social influence than informational social influence.

Question 17

What is the alternative explanation for LOC?

Answer 17

Elms and Milgram set out to investigate the disobedient participants in Milgram’s experiments, by follow up interviews with a sample of participants. They found that disobedient participants had an internal locus of control and scored higher on a social responsibility scale. Therefore, it appears that locus of control and social responsibility may be important factors in an individual’s ability to disobey orders or to defy social norms (show independent behaviour). This suggests that other factors need to be considered when explaining resisting social influence.

Question 18

What is a methodological criticism of LOC

Answer 18

locus of control has typically been assessed using the Rotter scale which was a 23 item forced choice scale. This consists of pairs of statements and for each item the respondent is asked to indicate which of the two statements more closely fits his or her views. As ever with self-report studies, there is the problem of social desirability bias, where respondents may feel the need to ‘say the right thing’ and participants may give answers they think will create a favourable impression. This would then cast doubt on the validity of the categorisation of respondents into internal or external types.

Question 19

Summarise social support as a situational explanation for resistance .

Answer 19

The presence of other people who resist the pressure to conform or obey and so help others to do the same

Having an ally, who shares the individuals view, breaks the unanimity of the group. Once the unanimous position of the majority is broken others are then ‘freed up’ to think, respond or behave in a different way to the majority.

Having a disobedient role model who resists the pressures to obey challenges the legitimacy of the authority figure.

Question 20

What is supporting evidence from conformity research for social support?

Answer 20

Asch’s (1951) variations. In one of the variations, one of the confederates was instructed to give the correct answer throughout. In this variation the rate of conformity dropped to 5% showing that having an ally makes it easier to resist conformity. Asch also showed that if the ‘non-conforming’ confederate started to conform again, then so does the naïve participant. This study therefore demonstrates that if an individual has social support for their belief, then they are more likely to resist the pressure to conform.

Question 21

Supporting evidence from obedience for social support

Answer 21

In one of Milgram’s variations, the real participant was paired with two additional confederates, who also played the role of teachers. In this variation, the two additional confederates refused to go on and withdrew from the experiment early. In this variation, percentage of real participants who proceeded to the full 450 volts, dropped from 65% (in the original) to 10%. This shows that if the real participant has support for their desire to disobey, then they are more likely to resist the pressure of an authority figure. Variations from Milgram therefore suggest that if an individual has social support then they are likely to resist the pressure to obey.

Question 22

Strength linking credibility for social support

Answer 22

social support does not even have to be valid to have an effect and help individuals to resist social influence for example Allen and Levine (1971) found that people resisted conformity even when the support was not particularly convincing e.g. they carried out an Asch style study where the ally wore thick glasses and said he had eyesight problems.

Question 23

What is the alternative explanation for social support

Answer 23

confidence that may also contribute to individuals resisting social influence. It is believed that individuals find it much easier to resist social influence if they have real confidence in the correctness of their own answers. In Lucas’ et al. (2006) study participants were given easy and hard problems in mathematics. They resisted social influence 92% if the questions were easy problems but only 29% of the time with hard problems. Additionally, Perrin and Spencer replicated Asch’s original study with engineering students in the UK and also found less conformity (only one out of 396 trials). It may be that they felt more confident in their precision of measuring lines. This suggests that people who are more confident are less influenced by the apparently ‘right’ view of the majority and are able to resist social influence.

Question 24

What is meant by minority influence?

Answer 24

A form of social influence that leads tp the majority converting their beliefs to match the minority

Question 25

What are the three main factors for minority influence ?

Answer 25

Consistency - most effective if the minority keeps the same beliefs, both over time and between all the individuals that form that minority. It is effective because it draws attention to the minority view and may get the majority to reassess the situation and rethink their own views. This can lead to the majority thinking deeply, leading to cognitive conflict and over time internalisation of the minority’s views.

Commitment-rity influence is more powerful if the minority demonstrates dedication to their position, cause or activity e.g. by making personal sacrifices (augmentation principle) or by engaging in extreme activities that are at some risk to the minority. The more this is shown by the minority, the more influential the minority would be. It is effective because it shows the minority is not acting out of self-interest which means they are taken more seriously.

Flexibility- It is effective as it shows the majority that by being flexible, they are willing to listen and adapt their point of view. This ability to compromise makes the majority more sympathetic to their cause. If the minority is flexible, they are more likely to be seen as a potential for serious change.

Question 26

Research support for minority influence.

Answer 26

Moscovici et al (1969). Moscovici et al found in a laboratory experiment with female participants, that when there were two confederates being consistent when estimating the colour of slides, the real participants agreed with the minority on 8.42% of the trials (i.e. they said the slides were green), whereas when the two confederates were inconsistent, only 1.25% of the participant’s answers were green. In a Control group (with no confederates) only 0.25% of the participants’ answers were green. This research therefore suggests that a consistent minority opinion has a greater effect on other people than an inconsistent opinion, demonstrating that consistency is a key element in minority influence.

Question 27

Supporting research for flexibility

Answer 27

Nemeth (1986) created groups of three participants and one confederate who had to decide how much compensation to pay a victim of a ski lift accident. When a consistent confederate argued for a low amount and refused to change his position, he had no effect on the majority. However, when he compromised a little and suggested a slightly higher amount, the majority changed their opinion to the lower amount. This shows minorities have to also be flexible to be persuasive. This therefore offers support for the idea that the most successful approach would appear to be a balance between consistency and flexibility.

Question 28

Why is validity a limitation of minority influence ?

Answer 28

criticised for lacking external validity. Both Moscovici and Nemeth’s research lack ecological validity as the research took place in a lab, therefore we need to be careful when we generalise these findings to real life minority influence. In addition, Moscovici’s research lacks population validity as the sample consisted of only female undergraduates. This is a biased sample, and we may question how far the results of minority influence research can be generalised to the wider population. As there are issues with the supporting research for minority influence, caution must be taken with the validity of minority influence as a form of social influence.

Question 29

What other factors are important for minority influence ?

Answer 29

ntification is also important for minority influence - There may be other factors as well as consistency, commitment and flexibility that may affect minority influence. When a majority identifies with the minority, then the minority will be more persuasive in getting the majority to convert to their viewpoint. For example, if the minority consisted solely of males it would be more persuasive in converting the beliefs and behaviours of other males that females. Mass et al., (1982) had a minority arguing for homosexual rights to a heterosexual majority. They found that if the minority were homosexual, they were less persuasive in changing majority heterosexual opinions than if the minority were also heterosexual. This is because the heterosexual majority identified with the heterosexual minority, making them more persuasive and therefore had a greater influence. This suggests that other factors such as identification also need to be considered when investigating minority influence.

Question 30

What are the steps to convert a majority by a minority?

Answer 30

DRAWING ATTENTION TO AN ISSUE

Minorities can bring about social change by drawing the attention of the majority to an issue. In 2016, Colin Kaepernick started to protest against police brutality towards black people, and worked to come up with an effective way to voice the protest. –This was to take a knee, instead of standing for the national anthem. This soon made national news.

COGNITIVE CONFLICT
Minorities challenge the majority’s cognitions, so they think more deeply about the issue being challenged. Now that Colin had drawn attention to the issue, this began to make people think more and question how black people are treated by the police. Other players also started to take the knee.

CONSISTENCY OF THE POSITION
Moscovici’s research showed that minorities expressing a consistent argument, both between themselves and over time have more influence over the majority. The protest by NFL players was consistent over 2-3 years, and the larger protests linked with the black lives matter protests are still ongoing and have been consistent in its protests and impact.

AUGMENTATION PRINCIPLE

If the minority is willing to suffer for their views, they are seen as more committed and will be taken more seriously by the majority. After Colin took the knee, he lost his career, he has never been signed by another NFL team since. In the weeks following initially taking the knee, he also received death threats.
For the black lives matter movement, large numbers of people took to the streets, taking huge risks during the pandemic to protest against police brutality towards black people.

SNOWBALL EFFECT
Minorities gather support gradually over time and their influence converts more and more until it reaches the tipping point where social change occurs. Over the past few years more and more people have questioned and protested against treatment of black people, and black lives matter protests have been seen all around the globe.

SOCIAL CHANGE OCCURS
At this stage social cryptoamnesia may exist, whereby society ‘knows’ social change has occurred but forgets the origins of it and so the majority does not give credit to the minority for the change taking place. Sadly, with the black lives matter movement we are not there yet.
We are currently living in a social change and it is still ongoing.

Question 31

Why is ISI an alternative explanation for social change

Answer 31

• Informational Social Influence (ISI) Social change can come about through informational social influence and providing arguments and information in favour of views. ISI is when individuals may not necessarily know the right way to behave and turn to others who they believe to be correct. Social change is encouraged by the attempt to gain information. ISI therefore takes longer to effect change as it requires time for people to question and examine their own beliefs, and therefore leads to internalisation of beliefs both privately and publicly and is usually permanent. This is unlike NSI influence which is based on compliance and causes more instant conformity. An example of ISI is that now more is known about the harmful effects of smoking; young people may have become convinced by such evidence, and a social change has occurred.

Question 32

Why is a disobedient model an alternative explanation for social change ?

Answer 32

A disobedient individual can act as a role model to demonstrate to others in society about how to resist the pressure to obey and instigate social change. The obedience rates in Milgram’s research fell when a disobedient model refused to give shocks in the variation of the original experiment. This opens the way for social change to occur at a society level. Another example of this is Rosa Parks who sat in an area at the front of a bus reserved for white people. This act of disobedience served to highlight racial inequality in the USA and was her example that many others followed.

Question 33

Why is NSI an alternative explanation for social change ?

Answer 33

where information is provided about what the majority are doing, and the social change is encouraged by the exposure to this majority behaviour. This is a technique used by health and environmental campaigns; it makes positive use of our tendency to conform to the majority. An example of this is Linkenback and Perkins (2003) who found adolescents exposed to a simple message that the majority of their peers did not smoke were subsequently less likely take up smoking.
In other words, social change is encouraged by highlighting what the majority actually do, rather than what others think they do and then the others alter their own behaviour to fit in with the behaviour of peers.

Question 34

Additional research evidence of the role of social influence .

Answer 34

. US research has shown the relationship between people’s normative beliefs and the likelihood of them taking up smoking. Linkenback and Perkins (2003) found that adolescents exposed to the simple message that the majority of their peers did not smoke were subsequently less likely to take up smoking. Normative social influence has also been used successfully to manipulate people to behave more responsibly when it comes to energy conservation. For example, Schultz et al (2008) found that hotel guests exposed to the normative message that 75% of guests reused their towels each day reduced their own towel use by 25%. Therefore, it is important to understand that it is not only minority influence which brings about social change, but majority influence can also be useful too.

Question 35

Why is validity a limitation of social influence

Answer 35

One limitation of using social influence processes to explain historical social changes is temporal validity. The social changes that are cited and discussed in relation to social influence are historical, with some occurring many years ago. The historical context of the event should be considered when examining the social change or the explanation could lack temporal validity. Furthermore, our knowledge of the events involved in the social change is derived from recollections and secondary documents such as diaries and newspapers. The retrospective data from historical evidence cannot always be verified as valid or accurate. For example, Rosa Parks is credited as the first African American woman to stand up to racial segregation in the US. However, nine months before Parks was jailed, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin was the first Montgomery bus passenger to be arrested for refusing to give up her seat for a white passenger. Therefore, when using social influence processes to explain social change it is essential to consider the validity of the historical sources in question.

Question 36

What was the methodological weakness of social influence

Answer 36

research studies of Moscovici, Asch and Milgram, who conducted famous laboratory experiments into minority influence, conformity and obedience. These were all early examples of highly controlled pieces of scientific research with human participants. However, the methodology used in these pieces of research, were artificial and did not reflect real life behaviour (they lack mundane realism) therefore, its usefulness in explaining social change is under scrutiny. When using social influence processes to explain social change, it is important to carefully consider any methodological issues with the underpinning research.

Question 37

What is a limitation of using social influence research to explain social change?

Answer 37

Nemeth (1986) argues that the effects of minority influence are likely to be delayed and indirect. There is a strong tendency in human behaviour to conform to the majority position, groups are more likely to maintain the status quo rather than to involve themselves in social change. It has taken many decades for the attitudes to change regarding drink driving and smoking. Additionally, the black lives matter campaign officially began in July 2013, and is still ongoing. Awareness has been created, however social change has not yet occurred in all areas of society, as we still have examples of discrimination. In years to come campaigners hope to see the change has fully occurred. It can be argued that the influence of the minority group is latent rather than direct, it creates the potential for change rather than the actual change itself. Therefore, it is important to not overstate the role of minority influence in explaining social change.