Obedience: situational variables

Question 1

What are situational variables?

Answer 1

Features of the immediate physical & social environment which may influence a persons behaviour

Question 2

What three situational variations did Milgram conduct?

Answer 2

• proximity
• location
• uniform

Question 3

When teacher and learner were in the same room what did the obedience rate fall to? (proximity)

Answer 3

65% to 40%

Question 4

What was the touch proximity & the obedience rate (proximity)?

Answer 4

• Teacher had to force learners hand onto a shock plate when he refused to answer question
• obedience dropped to 30%

Question 5

What was the remote instruction & obedience rate (proximity)?

Answer 5

• experimenter left the room and gave instructions to the teacher by telephone
• obedience dropped to 20.5%

Question 6

What is the explanation of the proximity variation?

Answer 6

• decreased proximity allows people to psychologically distance themselves from the consequences of their actions
• when teacher & learner separated ,teacher less aware of harm they were causing to another person so more obedient

Question 7

What happend in the location variation and what was the obedience rate?

Answer 7

• Milgram conducted a variation in a run-down office block rather than in the prestigious Yale university
• obedience fell to 47.5%

Question 8

What is the explanation of obedience rate in location variation?

Answer 8

• Prestigious university environment gave Milgram’s study legitimacy & authority
• pp’s perceived that the experimenter shared legitimacy & that obedience was expected
  =obedience still high in office block as they perceive ‘scientific nature’

Question 9

What happened in the uniform variation and what was the obedience rate?

Answer 9

baseline study> experiment wore grey lab coat as a symbol of authority
- in variation experimenter called away due to inconvenient phone call at start of procedure
- experiment taken over by ‘ordinary member of public’ in everyday clothes
- obedience rate = 20%

Question 10

What is the explanation of obedience rate in uniform variation?

Answer 10

• uniforms encourage obedience because they are widely recognised symbols of authority
• someone in uniform can expect obedience (authority is legitimate) compared to someone without

Question 11

What research support is there for the role of uniform on obedience?

Answer 11

• Bickman conducted a field experiment
• three male confederates dress as a milkman, guard or as a civilian & made requests of passers-by in a street
  e.g. pick up litter
• more likely to obey guard and least likely to obey civilian
• shows the powers of uniform in obedience

Question 12

What is a strength of Milgrams situational variables?

Answer 12

• Researchers studied obedience in Dutch participants
• participants ordered to say stressful things in an interview to someone desperate for a job > (90%) obeyed
• when person giving orders not present obedience decreased (proximity)
• valid across cultures

Question 13

Why is Milgram’s study criticised by Holland & Orne?

Answer 13

• argue that participants had realised the shocks weren’t real and just went along
• extra manipulation in the variations, even Milgram himself admitted that participants would have realised the shocks to not be real.
• Example- uniform variation.
  »we are unsure as to whether the results reflect genuine obedience or whether participants saw through the deception.

Question 14

What is another weakness of Milgrams variable to do with implications?

Answer 14

• Mandel argues supporting a situational explanation offers a ‘obedience alibi’
• offensive to survivors of the holocaust to say the Nazis were simply obeying orders & were in fact victims themselves of situational factors beyond their control.
• By arguing situational variables result in obedient behaviour, removes personal responsibility from the perpetrators.
• runs the risk of trivialising genocide.