Research into obedience- Milgram

Question 1

Baseline study Procedure

Answer 1

-40 ppts (1 per round)
-2 confederates per round (fake ppt and the experimenter)

The real ppt was always assigned to the ‘teacher’ role ‘randomly’ (it was rigged)

‘Teacher’ asks the learner to remember word pairs. When they got it wrong, the teacher gave them an ‘electric shock’, increasing in strength each time.

Up to 450 volts

Question 2

What was the ‘voice feedback study’ within the baseline study?

Answer 2

The ‘learner’ gave mainly wrong answers on purpose and stayed silent until 300 volts.

After 300 volts they began to pound on the wall, then not respond to the following question

Experimenter would tell the ‘teacher’ that they had to continue

Question 3

Baseline study Findings

Answer 3

-Predicted that ppts wouldn’t exceed 150 volts

-However, even in the ‘voice feedback’ study 65% of ppts continued to 450 volts

-All went up to 300 volts, and only 5 went no further

Question 4

AO3 -

Low ecological validity

Answer 4

-Lab experiment

-In real life people wouldn’t be asked to carry out such extreme tasks

Question 5

AO3 -

Low population validity

Answer 5

-Sample of 40 males

-Can’t be generalised to other populations (females) because it can’t be concluded that they would respond in the same way

Question 6

AO3 -

Ethics

Answer 6

Ppts were deceived
-There was deception as ppts thought they were giving real electric shocks

Limited right to withdraw
-Ppts were urged on by the experimenter and told that they could not stop

Many ppts also reported feeling guilty after giving the ‘shocks’

Question 7

AO3 +

Debriefing

Answer 7

Ppts were debriefed afterwards and told that they were not giving real electric shocks

They were also given the option to not have their information included in the study following the debrief