Obedience Flashcards
Milgram (1961)
Procedure
- 40 American men participated in a “memory study”.
- The participant read questions to the learner (a confederate) and administers shocks - increasing in voltage - for incorrect answers.
- Experimenter gives prompts to make the participant continue.
Milgram (1961)
Findings
- 65% gave shocks of 450V (maximum).
- 100% went to 300V.
- Many showed signs of anxiety (i.e. sweating); three had seizures.
Milgram (1961)
Variations
- Proximity.
- Location.
- Uniform.
Milgram (1961) Variations
Proximity
Situational Variable
- Obedience at 40% when T and L were in the same room.
- 30% for touch proximity.
Milgram (1961) Variations
Location
Situational Variable
- Obedience 47.5% in run-down office.
- Baseline study was conducted at a university.
University’s prestige increased the experiement’s legitimacy.
Milgram (1961) Variations
Uniform
Situational Variable
- Obedience 20% when experimenter (authority) was a “member of the public”.
- Uniform is an indicator for legitimacy of authority.-
Milgram (1961) Evaluation
Research Support
- French TV show replicated Milgram’s experiment in front of an audience.
- 80% gave the maximum shock and all showed signs of anxiety (like in Milgram’s study).
Supports Milgram’s original findings about obedience and shows they weren’t due to special circumstances.
Milgram (1961) Evaluation
Low Internal Validity
- It was argued that the participants behaved as they did because they didn’t believe the set up and were play-acting.
- Perry (2013) listened to tapes of Milgram’s participants and she noted only half of them believed the shocks were real.
Participants were only responding to demand characterists and trying to fulfill the aim of the study.
Milgram (1961) Evaluation
Counterpoint
Low Internal Validity
- A study was conducted with real shocks to a puppy by the experimenters orders.
- 54% of men and 100% of women gave what they thought was a fatal shock.
Shows participants were obedient even when the shocks were real.
Milgram (1961) Evaluation
Interpretation of findings
- Milgram’s conclusions about blind obedience may not have been justified.
- Milgram’s participants obeyed when the first 3 prompts were given.
- Every participant - without exception - disobeyed after the 4th prompt.
- According to Social Identity Theory (SIT), participants obeyed when they identified with the scientific aims of the research (‘the experiment requires you to continue’).
- Refused to blindly obey an authority figure.
SIT may be provide a more valid interpretation of Milgram’s research. Milgram himself suggested that ‘SIT is a reason for obedience’.
Milgram (1961)
Aim
To access obedience levels.
Definitions
Agentic State
Acting as an agent of another person.
Definitions
Autonomous State
Freedom to act according to conscience.
Definitions
Agentic Shift
The switch from autonomous to agentic state.
Definitions
Binding Factors
Allows individuals to ignore the damaging effects of their obedient behaviour, reducing moral strain.
Definitions
Authority
- Created by hierachical nature of society.
- Some people are entitled to expect obedience.
- Obedience is taught early in childhood.
Definitions
Destructive Authority
When an authority figure uses their power destructively and problems arise (e.g. Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust)
Definitions
Authoritarian Personality (AP)
- Adorno described AP as extreme respect for authority and sunmissiveness.
- Contempt for inferiors.
Authoritarian Personality
Origin
- Parents give conditional love.
- Harsh parenting creates hostility that cannot be expressed against parents.
- This is displaced onto scapegoats (those they percieve as weaker).
Adorno (1950)
Aim
To investigate the reasons behind an obedient personality.
Adorno (1950)
Procedure
- 2000 middle-class, American men and their attitudes towards other ethnic groups.
- The F-scale was devised in order to measure AP.
- “F” stands for Fascism.
- Participants rated statements on a 6-point scale from ‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’.
Adorno (1950)
Findings
- Those who scored 4-5.5 on the F-scale were said to have an Authoritarian Personality.
- Authoritarian people appeared to have a different cognitive style with regards to other social groups.
- Found a positive correlation between high F-scale scores and prejudice.
Adorno (1950): Evaluation
Research Support
- Milgram (+ Elms) interviewed fully obedient participants from the original experiment.
- The 20 completed the F-scale and scored significantly higher on the overall F-scale than 20 disobedient participants.
- The two groups were very different in terms of authoritarianism.
This supports Adorno’s view that obedient people share characteristics to people with an Authoritarian Personality.
Adorno (1950) Evaluation
Counterpoint
Research Support
- Researchers found the obedient participants had a number of characteristics that were unusual for authoritarians.
- They did not glorify their fathers, experience unusual levels of punishment in childhood and did not have hostile attitudes towards their mothers.
Link between obedience and authoritarianism is complex and are unlike each other in many ways.
Adorno (1950) Evaluation
Limited explanation
- Authoritarianism cannot explain behaviour in the majority of a country’s population.
- In pre-war Germany, millions of people displayed obedient and anti-Semitic behaviour, despite there being dispositional factors.
- It’s extremely unlikely they all possessed an Authoritarian Personality.
- Alternative view: they identified with the anti-Semitic Nazi state and scapegoated the ‘outgroup’ of Jews (SIT approach)
Adorno’s theory is limited because an alternative explanation is much more realistic.
Adorno (1950) Evaluation
Political Bias
- F-scale only measures the tendency towards an extreme right-wing ideology.
- They seperate the left- and right-wing ideologies, despite them having a lot in common.
- Both empathised the importance of complete obedience to political authority.
Adorno’s theory is not a comprehensive dispostional explanation that accounts for obedience to authority across the whole political spectrum.
Adorno (1950)
Flawed Evidence
- One man called the F-scale ‘a comedy of methodological errors’ because it is a flawed scale.
- It is possible to get a high score just be selecting ‘agree’ answers.
- Anyone with this response bias is assessed as having an AP.
