Milgram: Behavioral study of obedience.

Question 1

What is the aim of the study?

Answer 1

The aim of the study was to investigate how obedient individuals would be to orders received from a person in authority. Specifically if they would be obedient even when it would result in physical harm to another person.

Question 2

How did Milgrim test his aim of the study?

Answer 2

Arranged his laboratory-based procedure to involve giving electric shocks to a victim under the order of a researcher

Question 3

Why did Milgrim come up with this study?

Answer 3

To challange a dispositional argument that said that Germans had a defective personal trait that made high levels of obedience possible, this argument aimed to explain the actions done by Germans in the Holocaust.

Question 4

What was Milgrim’s explanation for the obedience of German’s during the Holocaust?

Answer 4

A situational explanation that said that many people would harm or kill people after given orders from an authority figure in the same situation.

Question 5

The design of this study is? What are some features of it?

Answer 5

A controlled observation(or lab experiment). In this setting all variables and measurements are controlled, while the behaviour of the participants is observed and recorded.

Question 6

Every participant in this study followed what?

Answer 6

The same procedure.

Question 7

What was the control condition?

Answer 7

There was no control condtion.

Question 8

How was the participant’s level of obedience determined/measured? How was it operationalized?

Answer 8

Participant’s obedience levels measured through observation. Operationalized through the maximum voltage a participant would give in response to orders.

Question 9

The participant’s/sample of this study were? How were they selected/recruited?

Answer 9

The sample was 40 men between the ages of 20 and 50 years. They were recruited/selected through a newspaper advertisement in New Haven (CT).

Question 10

Features of the sample/participant’s, who were they and why did they participate?

Answer 10

They were unskilled white collar workers, they participated because they were promised 4.50$

Question 11

Where did this study take place and why?

Answer 11

Took place in Yale University as it gave the study legitimacy and was a important situational factor for obedience.

Question 12

Participant’s initial arrival and meeting of stooge

Answer 12

Participant arrived and met a fake participant who was a stooge/fake for the study,

Question 13

In what experiment did the real participant think he was participating in?

Answer 13

Participant told he would be participating a experiment about the effects of punishment on learning.

Question 14

How was the fake experiment set up?

Answer 14

The stooge and participant would be allocated ‘learner’ and ‘teacher’ roles, they drew pieces of paper from a hat to determine the role. The election of roles was rigged and the stooge would always get the learner.

Question 15

The participant was taken to another room where the stooge was?

Answer 15

Strapped to a chair and had electrodes attached to him by the experimenter.

Question 16

What range did the shock generator that was presented to the participant have?

Answer 16

15V to 450V

Question 17

How was the shock voltage organized and what labels did it have?

Answer 17

Labelled in ascending order with words such as
‘moderate shock’, to ‘danger: severe shock’ and for the final two switches
‘XXX’.

Question 18

As demonstration the participant was given a shock of?

Answer 18

45V

Question 19

Did the stooge ‘learner’ receive actual shocks?

Answer 19

No

Question 20

Describe the experimenter of the fake study

Answer 20

He was a 31 year old teacher who wore a grey technician’s coat and had a serious manner

Question 21

The ‘memory task’ of the experiment was?

Answer 21

The participant ‘teacher’ reading pairs of words aloud to the learner, and subsequently testing the
learner on their recognition of the words.

Question 22

Each time the learner made a mistake the shock would increase by?

Answer 22

15V

Question 23

The learner’s (stooge) ‘mistakes’ were?

Answer 23

Intentional, already plan and got them wrong at particular times

Question 24

When 300V were reached what did the learner(stooge) do?

Answer 24

He pounded on the wall

Question 25

After 300V what did the learner(stooge) do?

Answer 25

Made no noise and stopped responding to the questions

Question 26

The experimenter after the stooge had gone quiet instructed what to the participant?

Answer 26

To continue with the questions and to take silence as an incorrect answer

Question 27

When participant’s protested, what verbal prods would the experimenter give?

Answer 27

“Please go on/Please continue/The experiment requires that you continue/It is absolutely
essential that you continue/You have no other choice, you must go on.”

Question 28

Were the verbal prods standardized?

Answer 28

Yes

Question 29

When was the procedure of the actual study completed?

Answer 29

When the participant “teacher” refused to give any more shocks or when 450V had been reached.

Question 30

One-way mirrors were used for what?

Answer 30

Physical behaviours of participants

Question 31

After the procedure was complete the participant’s were?

Answer 31

Were interviewed and the deception was explained to them, they also met the stooge ‘learner’

Question 32

What specific interview question were they asked?

Answer 32

To estimate how painful they thought the final 450 V shock was, on a scale of 0–14

Question 33

The mean for how painful participant’s thought the 450V shock was?

Answer 33

13.42 of a maximum of 14, showed that they were aware they were causing pain

Question 34

What was the mean voltage participant’s gave?

Answer 34

368V

Question 35

All participants gave at least how many voltages

Answer 35

300V

Question 36

What percentage of participants gave the maximum 450V?

Answer 36

65%

Question 37

Participant’s were observed

Answer 37

sweating, shaking and groaning,

Question 38

14/40 men showed signs of what?

Answer 38

Nervous laughter or smiling

Question 39

Participant’s who protested at orders said things such as?

Answer 39

‘I don’t think I can go on with this…I don’t think this is very humane’, and ‘I’m gonna chicken out…I can’t do that to a man, I’ll hurt his heart’

Question 40

Were the verbal prods given by the experimenter successful?

Answer 40

Yes

Question 41

How did participants act after the procedure was over?

Answer 41

Showed signs of relief, wiped their faces, sighed and shook their heads

Question 42

What does Milgrim’s study support?

Answer 42

The idea of a situational explanation for obedience

Question 43

The high level of obedience could be attributed to what 2 factors?

Answer 43

The legitimacy portrayed by the study, the location and the uniformed experimenter and feeling of financial obligation the participants had
towards the experiment.

Question 44

Milgrim concluded that the majority of people

Answer 44

Are much more obedient to authority than we might reasonably expect.

Question 45

Milgram concluded that even through high levels of obedience people still undergo stress because

Answer 45

This is due to a conflict between two important social phenomena: the need to obey those in authority and the need to avoid harming other people.

Question 46

As a result of this study being a controlled observation(lab experiment) what was possible?

Answer 46

Made it possible for extraneous variables in the environment to be controlled.

Question 47

What are some extraneous variables that were controlled?

Answer 47

The age and appearance of the actor playing the stooge

Question 48

What was standardized in this study?

Answer 48

Verbal prods used by the experimenter

Question 49

What was the result of standardization throughout the study?

Answer 49

The study became more reliable

Question 50

What was a way in which validity was increased, how did it do this?

Answer 50

The clever design of the electric shock generator and the example shock given to participants. ensured that participants were convinced that the study was real and that their actions actually mattered.

Question 51

The quantitative measure in this study was?

Answer 51

The voltage of shocks delivered by the participants

Question 52

The quantitative measurement in this study was?

Answer 52

An objective record of obedience for each participant

Question 53

What did the qualitative measurement of the participant’s behaviour provide?

Answer 53

A richer understanding of the tension between wanting to obey orders and wanting to obey one’s own conscience

Question 54

What is a weakness of the participants/sample used in this study?

Answer 54

Low generalizability

Question 55

Were the participants given fully informed consent?

Answer 55

No

Question 56

What study did participants think they were participating in?

Answer 56

Memory and punishment

Question 57

How were participants deceived throughout the study?

Answer 57

Believed the role of ‘teacher’ and ‘learner’ were randomly selected. They also were deceived to think stooge was actually experiencing pain.

Question 58

How were participants arguably denied the role to withdraw?

Answer 58

The obligation they felt from the research continuing and the verbal prods giving by the experimenter