SI- Obedience to Authority Flashcards
What is obedience?
- Obedience is a form of social influence in which an individual follows a direct order.
- The person issuing the order is usually a figure of authority, who has the power to punish.
Describe the process of Milgram’s study.
- Milgram placed an advert in a newspaper asking for male participants to take part in a study about the effect of punishment on learning.
- 40 participants were invited to the Psychology Department of Yale University
and were met by the experimenter, a man in a white laboratory coat, who was
really a confederate. - They were introduced to a 47-year-old man whom they
were told was another participant called Mr. Wallace. - Mr. Wallace and the
participant were asked to pick notes out of a hat to determine whether they
would play the role of a teacher or a learner in the experiment. - This was set up
so that Mr. Wallace was always the learner and the participant was always the
teacher. - The participant was then told that his role as teacher was to punish
the learner if they made a mistake on a memory test by administering an
electric shock, increasing the voltage each time the learner made a mistake. - The learner was taken to a room and hooked up to the electric shock machine.
- The teacher was placed in an adjoining room with the electric shock machine
controls and the experimenter which were fake but were very convincing. - Each switch was labelled with a
voltage rating, starting at 15 volts and rising in increments of 15 volts to a level
of 450 volts. - Additionally, each group of four switches was labelled with text
such as ‘Slight Shock’, ‘Moderate Shock’, all the way up to ‘Danger: Severe
Shock’.
-The final few switches were marked ‘XXX’. - As the shocks became more
severe Mr Wallace demanded to be released from the experiment, screamed,
kicked the wall, complained about his weak heart, refused to answer the
questions and finally went silent. - The experimenter ensured that the teacher continued with the experiment.
- When the teacher showed reluctance to shock the learner the experimenter
prompted him to continue, using one of four statements, ‘please continue’, ‘the
experiment requires that you continue’, and ‘it is absolutely essential that you
continue ’and ‘you have no choice, you must continue’.
Describe the findings of Milgram’s study.
- 100% of participants gave shocks up to 300 volts (when Mr Wallace
banged on the wall and stopped answering) and 65% of participants gave electric
shocks all the way up to the maximum 450 volts. - Participants felt a high level of
stress during the experiments, they showed symptoms including sweating,
trembling, and, in some cases, anxious and hysterical laughter. - Despite this, most were obedient and willing to inflict potentially lethal shocks on a man with
a weak heart
Evaluate Milgram’s study. (ADVANTAGES)
1) Despite the ethical issues with Milgram’s (1963) study many psychologists feel
that after conducting a cost-benefit analysis (weighing the harm a study has
done against the valuable knowledge is has provided) the study was worthwhile.
- We now know that most people could potentially do the same thing, leading to people taking more responsibility and not blindly following orders.
- The participants did not suffer any true long-term emotional disturbances and most
(84%) of them said they were happy to have taken part and that they had learnt
something important from the experience.
2) GOOD EXTERNAL VALIDITY
- Although this study appears to lack external validity at first glance because it was carried out in a lab, it still shows the relationship between the authority figure and the participant.
- Milgram argued that the lab environment accurately reflected real life authority.
- His research is also supported by Hofling et al’s study where 21/22 nurses were willing to exceed the maximum dose of a drug followed by Dr Smith’s orders over the phone, despite knowing if he was genuine.
Evaluate Milgram’s study. (DISADVANTAGES)
1) UNETHICAL
- During the experiment the participants became extremely distressed (some
became hysterical), and may have even thought that they had killed Mr Wallace,
so they were not protected from psychological harm.
- Also, several participants asked to leave the experiment but were told that they
were not allowed; this violates their right to withdraw from the experiment.
- Participants were deceived about the true nature of the experiment as they
were told it was about memory when it was really about obedience (this also
means they did not give their informed consent to take part)
2) UNREPRESENTATIVE
- The sample is unrepresentative as all of the participants were white American
males. Therefore the results cannot be generalised to women (gender bias) or
other cultures (cultural bias). Therefore we can conclude that Milgram’s study lacks population validity.
- However, Sheridan and King (1972) conducted a similar experiment with real shocks given to puppies and found that 100% of women conformed whilst 54% of men did - could be due to patriarchy and women needing to obey more in society
- Milgram’s study cannot be seen as representative of the American population as his sample was self-selected. This is because they became participants only by electing to respond to a newspaper advertisement (selecting themselves). They may also have a typical “volunteer personality”
3) Orne and holland (1968) argued that ppt had guessed the shocks were not real therefore conformed. Gina Perry’s (2013) research confirms this, she listened to tapes of milgram’s ppt and reported that many expressed doubts about the shocks being real. This suggests that Milgram did not test what he intended to as the study lack internal validity.
