Obedience - agency theory (AO3- evaluation) Flashcards
What is a strength of Milgram’s agency theory?
That it is supported by his 1963 study
How many ppts administered a shock of 300v to a confederate, as a punishment for making a mistake on a word learning task?
100% of the ppts
How many % of ppts went up to the final 450V switch, beyond the shock labelled ‘danger, extreme shock’?
65%
What does the study support?
Milgram’s theory that in the face of legitimate authority people are highly likely to carry out orders, despite high levels of moral strain
What is a competing argument for Milgrams agency heory?
Perry (2012) claims that the ppts saw through the deception.
Yale uni archives showed that that many ppts questioned whether the shocks were real
And across all of Milgrams variation studies more than 60% disobeyed the experimenter. This raises questions about the validity of agency theory as an explanation of obedience
What is a weakness of Milgram’s agency theory?
The agentic shift doesn’t seem to be inevitable (Steven Rank and Cardell Jacobson (1977))
What did Steven Rank and Cardell Jacobson (1977) find about Agency theory?
89% of nurses failed to obey orders from a doctor who asked to administer an overdose of the drug Valium.
Despite the doctor being an obvious source of authority, the vast majority of the sample remained autonomous
What did data show about what Steven Rank and Cardell Jacobson find about Agency theory
Data showed that the nurses did consider themselves responsible for their actions (i.e. no agentic shift)
Application: where can agency theory be applied?
Agency theory can be applied to a variety of military strategies
How is Agency theory used in the military?
When binding factors outweigh moral strain, obedience follows -
devised to ensure soldiers follow orders without question by reducing moral strain
What is an example of how agency theory is used in the military?
- Using dehumanizing language to refer to the enemy
- using euphemisms such as ‘collateral damage’ (= unintentional deaths of civilians in pursuit of a military target
What is minimized by using agency theory in the military?
Moral strain is thus minimized, and authority figures ensure that soldiers stay in the agentic state, even when ordered to commit barbarous acts eg torture.
Conclusion on Agency theory?
Oversimplified and may lead to destructive obedience
Aim of Milgram’s study
He wanted to investigate whether ordinary people would follow orders and give an innocent person a potentially harmful electric shock.
