Milgram in 21st century Flashcards
What was milgrams past?
- Jewish descent, parents emigrated to US in WW1
-family survived Nazi concentration camps
-interest in Holocaust
What was the aim?
-Examine how accused at Nuremberg trials justified acts of genocide during WW2
[Defence often based on obedience - following orders from their superiors]
How did he get people to partake and who?
Advert for p’s study on learning and memory.
40 males age 20-50 unskilled or profesh paid $4.50
What was the experimental set-up?
P always teacher [set-up]
Learner in room to chair and electrodes - p with experimenter-
What were the instructions?
p teach word pairs - mistake = shock
Danger warnings! On device
P gets a 45v sample shock
Actual experiment
Start - got answers right - starts to make mistakes
Voltage of shock increased, screams / vocalisations increased in intensity
p hesitated, experimenter said must continue
The learner script
150v - first request to get out
(see replications)
After 330v the ‘learner’ fell silent
P’s instructed to treat silence as an incorrect answer
Apply next shock level
The experimenter script
Four ‘prods’
P’s under diff levels of pressure to continue
No2: ‘Experiment requires that you continue’
No 4: ‘You have no other choice; you must go on’
[carried on when told they not responsible]
What were the coping strategies?
Pleaded with learner
Nervous laugh
Telling self it has to go on
What were the results?
65% max
Avg max = 360v
80% administered shock
Predicted 3% would go to max
Why were these the results?
Ambiguity of situation [influenced by exp]
Exp has authority - fam with test - has to be safe
diffusion of responsibility
What were the variations?
Office building = 48%
T + L in same room = 40%
Teacher force hand on shock plate = 30%
Exp leaves lab gives orders on phone = 23%
Exp leaves and normal man takes over = 20%
P sees 2 others rebel = 10%
What were the experimental issues?
Ecological validity? more rel to military context
Not representative - all male
Volunteer sample - more likely to comply
Learner male - gender bias? do it to woman?
standardised procedures - can be rep but mainly in western cult
What were the ethical issues?
Deception - mem&learn not obedience - necessary?
No protect of p’s - very stressed [heavy pressure needed?]
Right to withdraw? 35% did - difficult w/prods?
debriefed - 1yr later 83.7% glad they participated
Controversy & criticism
Bias reporting - milgram
Selective editing & reporting
Improv of prods - varied [26 times on one p]
Misrepresentation - 600 only told 1yr later [deception] - most not told
Replications - Burger (2009)
Profile analysis from original study
Found 150v threshold - willingness to go to max voltage
‘Learner’ vocalisations to quit study
79% went to max
Conditions of replications - Burger (2009)
Baseline condition - 1 T - 70% to 150v
2 T - (modelled refusal condition)
Stooge p, shock 90v, refuse to go on after ‘Learner’ complains
real p takes over ~ 63% to 150v
% lower than Milgram - not statistically significant
What was the Game of death replication?
Beavois et al, 2012
comply/resist tv host?
Results of game of death
good reporting
willing to give fatal shock - told to
81% (n=26) went to max shock in stnrd con
host-withdrawal – left after 80v
no authority figure = 28% (n=2)
news report - game of death
Power of tv made them do it
Expose tv mind-numbing power
Audience cheered on - 16/80 backed down
Proves willing to act against own morals
Act now – respond to situation ques
Why where Milgrams interpretations questioned?
4th prod = no obedience
More prod resembled order = less likely to comply
p’s response pattern opposite
Rather than evidence for obedience – orders from authority figure = disobedience
What was prod 4
“You have no other choice you must go on”
strong opp - even in rep studies [peer pressure from audience
Identification not obedience
Ps motivated by engagement / identification with scientific community
* not obedience
* obedience = acceptance of experimenter’s scientific goals
- 2nd prod relates to this
- “The experiment requires that you continue”
30 step procedure
- increasingly more objectionable tasks (Haslam et al., 2014)
- images (e.g. Family walking, Nurses, Traffic warden, Hells angels, Rioters, Ku Klux Klan)
- Select neg word (list)
- Milgram prods
- continuation predicted by prods linked to scientific goals cf. requests / orders
- Prod 2 – 40% more likely to compete task cf. Prod 4
- prods seen as orders – more disobedience
Game of death prods
First four prods - Milgram-like wording esp*
* ‘Go on with the questions’ *
* ‘Go on, don’t let yourself get upset’
* ‘The rules say you must go on’ *
* ‘Go on, we are taking all responsibility for this’
- Fifth prod directed to TV audience –
- ‘You can’t make him lose; what does the audience think?’
- [Milgram –’You have no other choice, you must go on’]
- Response - audience insisted that the game continued
Analysing the prods
Most participants carried on response to prods 2 and 3
* “Go on, don’t let yourself get upset”
* “The rules say you must go on”
- Fifth prod – more order-like
- only 1 p complied
- Supports the critique of Milgram –
- engagement with the experimental process (i.e. game show rules) will elicit obedience, not an order
