milgrams obedience Flashcards
what is obedience
an individual follows orders from an individual. the individual who gives the order will usually be a figure of authority- can be due to power knowledge social role, relation to the status of this person
aim of mailgrams electric shock experiment
he wanted to study how easily someone would obey to an authority figure, to the extent that they could potentially physically harm someone.
procedure
40 male pps were the teacher and the experimenter and learner were confederates- researcher was instructed to give increasing shocks to the learner for every wrong answer. the shocks started at 15v and went up to 450v - the shocks were not real and learner responses were recorded. experimenter used 4 generic ‘prods’ eg. “you have no other choice you must go on”
findings
no pps stopped below 300v - 12.5% stopped at 300v - 65% continued to the highest voltage of 450 - qualitive data was collected through observations- pps showed signs of extreme tension
conclusion
ordinary people are likely to follow orders given by an authority figure even to the extent of killing someone- people tend to obey orders from other people if they recognise their authority as morally right and/or legally based.
