Obedience

Question 1

What is obedience?

Answer 1

The compliance with an order, request, law or submission to another authority

Question 2

What are the two psychological explanations for obedience ?

Answer 2

The agentic state

Legitimacy of authority

Question 3

What is the Agentic state?

Answer 3

A state of mind which person will allow other people to direct their behaviours and pass responsibility for the consequences

Question 4

What is legitimacy of authority?

Answer 4

A statement made by milgrim that suggests we are more likely to obey a person who has a higher position or status

Question 5

What are the evaluation points of the agentic state?

Answer 5

• we are socialised from childhood to obey rules
• people who obey someone else’s rules no longer see their own responsibility but to the person who told them to do it
• concern around maintaining a positive self-image restricts behaviour but now the responsibility of self image doesn’t apply

Question 6

What are the evaluation points of legitimacy of authority?

Answer 6

• childhood we’ve been ‘programmed to respect and obey those in higher authority, including parents
• we obey the police and those regarded in law, doctors and teacher to not get in trouble as they’ve got power

Question 7

What is meant by dispositional?

Answer 7

The explanation of individual behaviour as a result of internal characteristics that reside within the individual, opposed to external influences that seam from environment or culture

Question 8

What is the authoritarian personality?

Answer 8

Includes extreme respect for authority and contempt for ‘inferiors’. They have conventional attitudes towards race and gender.

Question 9

How is the authoritarian personality formed?

Answer 9

Forms in childhood through harsh parenting and extremely strict discipline, expectation of loyalty, impossibly high standards and serve criticism.

Question 10

What is some research that supports the authoritarian personality ?

Answer 10

Adorno et al
Study investigated unconscious attitudes towards other racial groups of more than 2,000 middle class white Americans

Question 11

What is the fascism scale?

Answer 11

Measures the belief between “Obedience and respect for authority are the most important virtues for a child” or the belief that “there is hardly anything lower than a person who does not feel great love, gratitude and respect for others”

Question 12

What are the positive evaluation points for the dispositional explanation?

Answer 12

High amount of control

Question 13

What are the negative evaluation points for the dispositional explanation?

Answer 13

• politically biases towards right wing ideology

- flawed methodology (items are worded in the same ‘direction’ so the scales just measure tendency to agree ‘

Question 14

What is meant by a situational variable?

Answer 14

Factors in the environment that can unintentionally affect the results of a study.

Question 15

What are the 3 situational variables that affect obedience?

Answer 15

Proximity
Location
Uniforms

Question 16

What is proximity?

Answer 16

Milgrim found when the experimenter left the room and gave orders on a phone,
More people were able to resist

Question 17

What is location ?

Answer 17

Milgrims research was at a university which added to the perceived legitimacy of the authoritative giving out orders.
Research was also done ins run down officer block, resistance was greater

Question 18

What is uniforms?

Answer 18

In milgrims study he wore a white lab coat, adding to his perceived authority.

Question 19

What are the negative evaluation points for situational variables affecting obedience?

Answer 19

• varies on who the person giving orders is

- doesn’t work if they know the person