Milgram's 1963 study Flashcards
State the aim of Milgram’s 1963 study on obedience
Aims to investigate whether ordinary individuals would obey the morally wrong orders of an authority figure to cause pain to another person.
Procedure of Milgram’s 1963 study
40 middle aged white men from New Haven volunteered. They were deceived into thinking they were administering electric shocks. They were told that the study was about the role of punishment in learning. The genuine participant had the teacher role and the confederate had the learner role. The learned had to memorise word pairs and the teacher had to administer shocks to the learner if he got any answers wrong. The teacher sat in front of a shock generator with the volts going up in 15. At the start, the learner answered correctly and then he started making mistakes, where the teacher would shock the learner. The volts would increase every time the confederate got an answer wrong. No shocks were actually given. The experiment continued until all shocks were given, or until the teacher refused to no longer take part. The participants were given 4 prods which encouraged them to remain in the study. They were then debriefed at the end, and taken to the learner accomplice.
What were the 4 prods Milgram used?
- Please continue
- The experiment requires to continue
- It is absolutely essential that you continue
- You have no choice but to continue
Findings of Milgram’s study
All pps went to at least 300 votes. 65% of pps went to the end of the shock generator. Most pps found the procedure very stressful. Some showed extreme sign of distress and anxiety. Although pps dissented verbally, they continued.
What did Milgram conclude?
Under certain circumstances, most people obey the orders that go against their conscious. When people occupy subordinate position, in a dominance hierarchy, they become liable to lose feelings of empathy and compassion and are inclined towards blind obedience.
Generalisability (Milgram
1963 study)
A01: sample had 40 white middle aged males from New Haven.
A03: Sample can be considered as a limitation as low population validity therefore lacks generalisability. It’s difficult to generalise the results to females as they can show different results of obedience due to empathy - androcentric. It is also difficult to generalise the results to other demographics outside New Haven.
Therefore, the sample is an unrepresentative sample, and is ethnocentric.
Reliability (Milgram 1963 study)
AO1: standardised procedures were used; set conditions, set prods, set prerecorded tapes from the learner. Milgram replicated his study in many variation in order to change situational factors.
A03: standardised procedures can be considered a strength. As it’s highly reliable and replicable. Experiment can be repeated multiple times to test reliability and consistency of results.
Migram’s variations demonstrate replicability and reliability of results. standardisation removes extraneous variables each time. Other researchers could also replicate following his standardised procedures. Therefore there is high reliability and replicability.
Validity (Migram 1963 study)
AO1: lab experiment located in Yale university - controlled conditions.
Deception was used regarding the task and roles given.
A03: Lab experiment can be used as a strength, as experimenter is able to control most variables in order to test and measure obedience levels. High internal validity, as there was authority, orders and prods.
The deception can be argued as justified, as it reduces demand characteristics. Lab can be limitation as tasks and environment are unrealistic, therefore lowers mundane realism and low external
ecological validity.
Ethics (Milgram 1963 study)
AO1: Deception was used with pps by concealing the true aim of the study.
Fully informed consent was not achieved as pps did not know the true aim of the study due to the deception used.
Withdrawal was not adhered to as when pps wanted to withdraw Migram used 4 prods to order pps to continue. This meant they felt they were unable to withdraw. Milgram did not inform them of their right to withdraw.
Protection of pps was not adhered to as pps felt intimidated by the experimenter, the 4 prods used and the prestige of the environment made them feel psychologically strained, pressured, guilty and anxious.
AO3: Deception was justified as it was the only way to generate unbiased results by reducing demand characteristics. Not using informed consent was justified as fully informed consent would be difficult to achieve without increasing the risk of demand characteristics. Pps knew enough about the task to give consent for that.
(right to withdraw) Justified because without the prods the experiment would ack internal validity due to a lack of reinforcement of orders to shock the pps and for the experimenter to show authority.
