Obedience

Question 1

Define obedience

Answer 1

-complying with the demands of an authoroity figure

Question 2

Define a benign authority figure

Answer 2

-directing someone to act in a socially acceptable way

Question 3

Define a malevolent authority figure

Answer 3

-directing someone to act in an immoral way

Question 4

Why did Milgram carry out his experiment

Answer 4

-to see whether Germany was a particularly highly obedient country or if all of us are capable of the same levels of obedience

Question 5

What was the aim?

Answer 5

-to see how obedient people would be in a situation where obeying other would mean breaking their own moral code to hurt an innocent person

Question 6

Give 7 key facts about the procedure

Answer 6

• They were deceived into thinking it was about memory and punishment
• There was an experimenter and another ‘fellow particapant’ - who was actually a confederate playing the role of the learner
• the learner couldn’t be seen and audio files were used for his responses
• shocks were given if an answer was wrong or not answered
• there were no real shocks. they supposedly went up by 15v each time and reached 450v
• verbal prods were used

Question 7

Give 3 key findings

Answer 7

• every participant gave at least 300v
• 62.5% reached 450 volts
• most showed visible signs of distress - three had uncontrollable seizures and only some showed few, if any signs of discomfort

Question 8

What did Milgram conclude

Answer 8

• people have a strong tendency to obey orders even when they go against their morals
• as a result - to try and identify the reasons why people are so obedient he carried out 19 different variations

Question 9

Give two strengths of the study

Answer 9

• allowed us to understand possible reasons for the holocaust
• has a high reliability and easy to replicate

Question 10

What ethical issues were raised

Answer 10

• deception

- protection from harm was lacking

Question 11

What did Baurmind argue

Answer 11

that milgram showed insufficient respect - and long term psychological harm could have occurred. it also may mean participants would no longer trust psychologists or people in authority.

Question 12

Why was milgram accused of not protecting his participants from harm?

Answer 12

• due to extreme stress and there weren’t adequate steps to protect them from psychological harm
• however only 2% said they regretted taking part in the study and many said they learnt something new about themselves

Question 13

Why was Milgram accused of deception

Answer 13

• they could not give informed consent

- however it was necessary

Question 14

Why was Milgram accused of a lack of informed consent

Answer 14

• lack of debriefing of over 30,000.

- he believed they could confound his results

Question 15

Why was Milgram accused of not giving participants the right to withdraw

Answer 15

• they weren’t explicitly told

- 35% however did withdraw

Question 16

What did Orne and Holland claim

Answer 16

-that there were demand characteristics - despite 70% saying they thought it was real

Question 17

How well can Milgram’s research be applied to ecological validity

Answer 17

• some criticised the study for lacking it - as it was too artificial
• Hofling et al’s study however proved this wrong - when nurses in a hospital received a phone call from a doctor they didn’t know to administrate an unknown drug to a patient. 21 out of 22 obeyed.

Question 18

How well can Milgram’s research be applied to population validity?

Answer 18

• there is gender bias so it is androcentric
• Sheridan and King found that women were more obedient than men in giving electric shocks to puppies
• there is also a culture bias

Question 19

What have reseachers found in terms of cultural differences

Answer 19

• Spain had the highest levels with 90% obeying

- Only 28% obeyed in Austrailia

Question 20

How well can Milgram’s research be applied to temporal validity

Answer 20

-is high because Burger replicated it and 70% obeyed and went past 150v

Question 21

What is the agentic theory

Answer 21

-an explanation for obedience
-proposes the two different social states - autonomous to agentic
the agentic shift means people mindlessly accept authority’s demands and see themselves as no longer responsible
-used to deal with anxiety and we are conditioned to respect authority

Question 22

Evaluate milgram’s theory that the agentic state caused the events during the holocaust

Answer 22

• it was argued that the state couldn’t last that long

- fails to explain the gradual conversion of many doctors

Question 23

What is the legitimacy of authority

Answer 23

• increased by location and uniform and proximity - situational variables
• social heirarchy should be obeyed through this

Question 24

Evaluate the legitimacy of authority in the experiment

Answer 24

• the participants clearly recognised the legitimacy of authority
• this was shown when obedience dropped to 47.5% when location changed

Question 25

What did Tarnow find

Answer 25

-when reviewing serious air accidents - he found that crew had an excessive dependence of the captain. 19/37 failed to challange the errors made

Question 26

what are situational variables

Answer 26

-external explanations of obedience

Question 27

Explain proximity

Answer 27

• how aware the person is of their actions and consequences depending on distance
• when the teacher and learner were only 46cm apart obediance dropped to 40%
• gas chambers and their use is an example of this —> less damage psychologically

Question 28

Explain location

Answer 28

• can increase or decrease legitimacy and therefore obedience
• (47.5% obeyed in less prestigious surroundings)

Question 29

Explain uniform

Answer 29

• increase legitimacy

- lab coat

Question 30

What did Bickman’s study show

Answer 30

• people were asked to either pick up rubbish, lend a coin, or move away from a bus stop
• obedience rate when auth. figure wore normal clothes -19%
• milkman - 14%
• security guard - 38%

Question 31

What is a dispositional factor for obedience

Answer 31

authoritarian personality

Question 32

Evaluate situational factors

Answer 32

they do not tell us about the person but personality factors can - and can also tell us why they may not have obeyed

Question 33

What is the authoritarian personality

Answer 33

a personality type characterised by a tendency to see the world in black and white so believe strongly in obeying authority.

Question 34

What is the f-scale questionnaire

Answer 34

a questionnaire which measures someones degree of ap

Question 35

what did Adorno suggest about the personality type

Answer 35

that it was shaped in early childhood due to strict parenting .
often insecure and fearful of social change

Question 36

Name two strengths of the theory

Answer 36

Elms and Milgram -found a link that those more obedient in the study had a higher f-scale
Altemeyer - found that people with ap who were told to give themselves shocks gave themselves higher shocks than those WITHOUT ap

Question 37

Name two limitations of the theory

Answer 37

-link is correlational - much like education
(but other research has found that when this is the control variable - people who are more obedient still show signs of AP - so AP could be a better explanation anyway)
-suffers from response bias

Question 38

What did Altemeyer produce to combat response bias in the f scale

Answer 38

• a less biased scale with an equal number of pro and anti statements
• right wing is more obedient
• supported by Begue - left wing ppts gave lower intensity shocks - supporting the role of Ap in obedience