Explanations for obedience Flashcards
What does situational mean and identify situational factors that affect obedience and explain why?
-Situational means the circumstance and the environment
- proximity
- location
- uniform
- perception of legitimate authority
- agentic state
- justified obedience
Explain how proximity affects obedience and identify evaluation points for proximity
- Proximity is distance and the distance someone has with the victim will affect obedience.
- The further away they are from the victim the more likely they will obey as the consequences from their actions are buffered
- A buffer is anything that protects an individual from confronting the consequences of their actions and proximity acts as a buffer
AO3:
-Millgram (Victim stayed silent and obedience rose up to 100%)
-Sheridan Kings study females were in close proximity and all of them continued to give dog electric shocks
Explain how location affects obedience and identify evaluation points for location
-The location will affect the likelihood of someone obeying, the place where the order is given out will affect obedience rates. If it is given out in a high prestigious location with a status obedience is more likely to occur.
AO3:
-Millgram (run down building instead of Yale university obedience levels fell to 47.5% which is less than the original 65%)
Explain how uniform affects obedience and identify evaluation points for uniform
-Uniform will affect obedience, uniform affects an individuals authority so if the uniform someone is wearing indicates a high status we are more likely going to obey such as a police uniform.
AO3:
-Millgram’s variation (Instead of experimenter it was a ordinary member of the public who wasn’t wearing a grey lab coat obedience rates fell to to 20% instead of the original 65%)
Explain how perception of legitimate authority affects obedience and identify evaluation points for perception of legitimate authority
-Individuals will obey someone who is perceived to be an authority figure as they accept they have a higher status and more power than them in a particular situation. Someones authority is assessed by looking at the context, situation and environment (for example someones uniform)
AO3:
-Millgram’s variation (ordinary member of the public giving out unjust orders not wearing lab coat obedience rates fell to 20% which is lower than the original study 65%)
Explain how agentic state affects obedience and identify evaluation points for agentic state
-individuals are more likely to obey if they see themselves as an agent of the authority figure and have entered an agentic state. When individuals enter agentic state they diffuse themselves from any responsibility and transfer the responsibility to their authority figure, they believe they wont be held accountable for their actions.
AO3:
-Hofling
Explain how Justified obedience affects obedience and identify evaluation points for justified obedience.
If individuals believe if they obey and it is for the greater good and that it is the correct thing to do which will result in a positive outcome they are more likely going to obey an authority figure.
AO3:
-Hofling (they might of broke rules but they might of believed that the drug would have made the patient better)
what is dispositional and identify a dispositinal factor that affect obedience?
- It refers to peronality rather than the context or the environment
- Authoritarian personality
Explain what authoritarian personality is?
- It is a personality type which makes people more likely to obey.
- people with this personality type are more submissive to those in a higher status and are dismissive of those who are lower in status than them and are inferior
Explain how authoritarian personality is formed
Adorno suggested authoritarian personality was formed if an individual was brought up by strict parents who use harsh physical punishments which made them very obedient.
- they would then develop hostile feelings towards others (who are inferior) but also be very submissive and obedient towards authority figures.
- The strict parenting creates hostility in a child therefore they will displace onto those who are inferior to them as they cannot be shown to the parents directly this is known as scapegoating
What traits do people with authoritarian personality have and how do we measure these traits?
traits:
-Conventional, dogmatic, obedient and conformists
-The F scale measures different components that make up the authoritarian personality and whoever scored higher in the F scale would more likely have authoritarian parents
What are evaluation points for Authoritarian personality
- other situational factors must be taken into account, as it is very unlikely every Nazi in germany when hitler was in power had an authoritarian personality
- correlation (obedience can cause change in personality)
- Millgram made participants who did obey take the Fscale and found that they would score high on the F scale
