Obedience Flashcards
Define Obedience to Authority
This refers to a type of social influence whereby somebody acts in response to a direct order from a figure with perceived authority.
Milgram Study 1963 Aim
To investigate what level of obedience would be shown when participants were told by a figure of authority to administer electric shocks to another person.
Milgram Study 1963 Procedure
Milgram recruited male participants from Yale University.
The experimenter told the participant that they would be taking part in the experiment as either a ‘learner’ or a ‘teacher.’ In reality the experimenter’s confederate would always be the ‘learner’ and the real participant would be always be the ‘teacher.’
The participant would ask the ‘learner’ questions and each time the learned got a question wrong they would flick the switch and give them a shock.
Shocks would go from 15 volts to 450 Volts
If at any point during the experiment the participant refused to go on, then the experimenter had four phrases or prods that he would use to coerce the participant to continue with the experiment. Such as
* ‘Please continue/go on’
* ‘The experiment requires that you continue’
* ‘You have no other choice, you must go on’
* ‘Although the shocks may be painful they are not harmful’
Milgram Study 1963 Findings
Predictions by different groups was that very few participants would use more than 150 volts and only 1 in 1’000 would continue to 450 volts. In fact 65% of the participants continued to the maximum shock level (450 volts) All participants continued to at least 300 volts, with only 5 withdrawing at this point.
Milgram Study 1963 Conclusion
Milgram concluded from his initial experiment and the variations that:
Ordinary people are astonishingly obedient to authority when asked to behave in an inhumane way
It is not necessarily evil people who commit evil crimes but ordinary people who are just obeying orders.
An individual’s capacity for making independent decisions is suspended under certain situational constraints – namely, being given an order by an authority figure
Situational Factors in Obedience:
Proximity of victim
In the initial experiment the victim was in a different room to the participant delivering electric shocks. However when the participant was able to see the victim, the obedience rate dropped to 40%, and if the participant was required to physically touch the victim it dropped to 30%. This shows that people find it easier to follow an order to harm another person if they are unable to see their victim.
Situational Factors in Obedience:
Seedy Office Building
Moving the experiment from the imposing and highly respected Yale University to a downtown office building caused a drop in obedience rate to 48%. The location in which orders are given therefore seems to have an effect on whether or not they are followed, and this may explain why governments, law courts, and military leaders are usually located in imposing buildings.
Situational Factors in Obedience:
The Power of uniform
Uniforms are easily recognizable and convey power and authority, which becomes symbolized in the uniform itself. It was found obedience rates were highest when a female confederate wore a uniform than when she dressed as a business executive or a beggar
Situational Factors in Obedience:
The Power of uniform
Uniforms are easily recognizable and convey power and authority, which becomes symbolized in the uniform itself. It was found obedience rates were highest when a female confederate wore a uniform than when she dressed as a business executive or a beggar
Evaluate Milgrams Research Into Obedience:
Ethical Issues
It was claimed Milgram had little concern for the well being of his participants. For example he had deceived his participants into believing it was a study on the effects of punishment on learning. This prevented them from making an informed decision about their participation. The right to withdraw had been compromised by the use of experimental ‘prods’
Evaluate Milgrams Research Into Obedience:
Individual Differences & The influence of Gender
Milgram is criticised for ignoring gender as an individual difference. However Milgram did a follow up study and tested women. These women had the same obedience level (65%) as men. This lends support to the idea tat the original sample was representative.
Evaluate Milgrams Research Into Obedience:
External Validity & The Obedience Alibi
Mandel claims that conclusions about the determinants of obedience are not borne out by real-life events. A Study of reserve police Battalion 101 showed that, despite the presence of many factors shown by Milgram to increase defiance, men carried out their orders without protest.
Evaluate Milgrams Research Into Obedience:
Historical Validity
Blass Carried out an analysis of replications of Milgrams study carried out between 1961 and 1985. He found no relationship between the date of publication and the obedience levels obtained.
Likewise Burger found almost identical levels of obedience to those found y Milgram 46 years earlier, demonstrating that Milgram study has considerable historical validity.
Define Agentic State
A Person sees himself or herself as an agent for carrying out another persons wishes
Define Legitimacy of authority
A person who is perceived to be in a position of social control within a situation
Explain The Agentic State as an explanation for obedience
An individual moves from an autonomous state where they see themselves as responsibility for their own actions into an agentic state, where they see themselves as an agent carrying out another persons wishes. As a result the individual feels no responsibility for the actions the authority dictates.
Explain Self-Image and the agentic state as an explanation for obedience
People may adopt an agentic state in order to maintain a positive self-image. Actions performed under the agentic state are, from the participants perspective, virtually guilt-free.
Explain Binding Factors as an explanation for obedience
In Order to break off the experiment, the participant must breachthe commitment that he made to the experimenter. The participant fears that if they break off they will appear arrogant and rude, Which binds them into obedience.
Explain Legitimacy of authority
For a person to shift to the agentic state they must perceive a legitimate authority. IE someone who is perceived to be in a position of social control within a situation. In Milgrams study the participants enters the laboratory with an expectation that someone will be in charge. The experimenter, upon first presenting himself, fills this role for them.
Explain the definition of the situation for explaining Legitimacy of authority
There is a tendency for people to accept definitions of a situation that are provided by a legitimate authority. Although it is the participant himself who performs the actions he allows the authority figure to define its meaning
Explain How Legitimate authority requires an institution for explaining Legitimacy of authority
If an authority figures commands are of a potentially harmful or destructive form, Then for them to be perceived as legitimate they must occur within some kind of institutional structure.
Evaluate Explanations for Obedience:
The agentic State explanation and real-life obedience
The idea of rapidly shifting states fails to explain the very gradual and irreversible transition that lifton found in his study of German doctors at Auschwitz. It is suggested that rather than agentic shift being responsible for this transition, it is the experience of carrying out acts of evil over a long time that changes the way in which individuals think and behave.
Evaluate Explanations for Obedience:
Agentic State or just plain cruel
One common belief is that Milgram had detected signs of cruelty among his participants, who had used this situation to express their sadistic impulses. This belief is supported by Zimbardo in the SPE where within just a few days the guards inflicted rapidly escalating cruelty on increasingly submissive prisoners despite the fact there was no obvious authority figure instructing them to do so
Evaluate Explanations for Obedience:
The legitimate authority explanation and real-life obedience
Legitimacy can serve as justification to harm others. If people authorize another person to make judgement for them about what is appropriate conduct they no longer feel that their own moral values are relevant to their conduct. As a consequence when directed y a legitimate authority figure to engage in immoral actions people are alarmingly willing to do so
Evaluate Explanations for Obedience:
The agentic state as loss of personal control
It is suggested that the reason for agentic shift is a reduction in an individuals experience of personal control
IE Where they feel less in control of their actions as would have been the case in the unfamiliar psychology laboratory. Under such circumstances people may show an increased acceptance of external sources of control to compensate for this
Evaluate Explanations for Obedience:
Obedience in the cockpit- a test of legitimate authority
Tarnow provided support for the power of legitimate authority through a study of aviation accidents. As with Milgrams study where the participant accepts the experimenters definition of the situation, Tarnow found excessive dependence on the captains authority and expertise. Lack of monitoring errors were evident in 9 of the 37 accidents investigated.
Define Authoritarian Personality
A Distinct personality pattern characterised by strict adherence to conventional values and a belief in absolute obedience or submission to authority
Define Dispositional
Explanations of behaviours such as obedience emphasise them being caused by an individuals own personal characteristics rather than situational influences within the environment.
Define F Scale
A measure of authoritarian traits or tendencies
Define Right-Wing Authoritarianism
A Cluster of personality variables that are associated with a ‘Right-wing’ Attitude to life.
Explain The Authoritarian Personality and the F Scale
This provides a dispositional explanation for why some individuals require little pressure in order to obey. High scores on the F Scale is indicative of an authoritarian personality.
Individuals with this type of personality obeyed authority and enforced strict adherence to social rules and hierarchies.
Adorno found that people who scored high on the F Scale tended to be raised by parents with an authoritarian parenting style and a strong emphasis on obedience
Explain Right Wing Authoritarianism
Altemeyers identified three of the original personality variables that he referred to as right wing authoritarianism
- Conventionalism
- Authoritarian Submission
- Authoritarian Aggression
Elms and Milgram Procedure
Follow-Up study of participants who had taken part in one of Milgrams experiments two months before. They selected 20 ‘obedient’ (450 volt) participants and 20 ‘defiant’ (Who refused at some point)
Participants completed the F scale and were interviewed about their childhood and their attitudes to Milgram experimenter and learner
Elms and Milgram Findings
The researchers found higher levels of authoritarianism among participants classified as obedient compared with those classified as defiant.
Obedient participants reported being less close to their fathers during childhood and saw the experimenter in Milgrams study as more admirable and the learner as much less so
The Authoritarian Personality Evaluation:
Research Evidence for the authoritarianism/ Obedience link
A Problem for obedience studies in the participants suspicions that the shocks might be fake. Dambrun and Vatine overcome this by informing participants that the experiment was a simulation and that the shocks and were not real, but simulated. Despite this, participants responded as if the situation was real, and those who displayed higher levels of RightWingAuthoritarianism were the ones who obeyed the most
The Authoritarian Personality Evaluation:
The social context is more important
Milgram did not believe the evidence for a dispositional basis to obedience was strong. He showed that variations in the social context of the study were the main cause of differences in participants, levels of obedience, not variations in personality. Replying on an explanation of obedience based purely on authoritarianism lacks the flexibility to account for these variations.
The Authoritarian Personality Evaluation:
Differences between authoritarian and obedient participants
Elms and Milgram found differences in the characteristics of the authoritarian personality and of obedient participants. Many of the fully obedient participants had a very good relationship with their parents, rather than the overly strict family environment associated with the authoritarian personality. This suggests authoritarianism is not the only cause of obedience.
The Authoritarian Personality Evaluation:
Education may determine authoritarians and obedience
Psychologists found less educated people are more authoritarian than the well educated, Participants with lower levels of education tended to be more obedient than those with higher levels. This suggests that instead of authoritarianism causing obedience, lack of education could be responsible for both authoritarianism and obedience.
The Authoritarian Personality Evaluation:
Left-Wing views are associated with lower levels of obedience
Idea of RWA suggests that people who define themselves as politically ‘right-wing’ would be more likely to obey authority, but would people who define themselves as ‘left-wing’ would be less likely to obey?
Psychologists provide support for this on a fake game show. Participants who described themselves as ‘left wing’ delivered shocks of lower intensity.
