situational explanations- agentic state, legitimacy of authority

Question 1

Milgrams reasoning for obedience research

Answer 1

• sparked by Eichmanns 1961 trials on war crimes
• he was in charge of nazi camps and his reasoning was that he was obeying orders from destructive authority
• destructive authority occurs because agents is taking orders and doesn’t take responsibility
• that person is an ‘agent’

Question 2

What is an agent?

Answer 2

• someone who acts in the place or for another
• not an unfeeling puppet
• experience high moral strain when they realize what they’re doing it wrong
• feel powerless to disobey

Question 3

what is agentic shift

Answer 3

• change from autonomous to agentic state
• when they perceived someone else as the authority figure
• greater position on the social hierarchy
• when one person is in charge, others defer to the legitimate authority

Question 4

autonomous state

Answer 4

• free to behave according to their own principle
• feels a sense of responsibility for their actions

Question 5

Binding factors of the autonomous state

Answer 5

• aspects of the situation that allow people to minimize the damaging effect of their behaviour
• reduces the ‘moral strain’ they’re feeling
• shift responsibility to the victim to deny their damage

Question 6

why do we have legitimate Authority figures

Answer 6

• legitimate and agreed by people in society
• except authority figures need to exercise social power, so society can function smoothly

Question 7

consequences of legitimacy of authority

Answer 7

• some people are allowed the power to punish people
• we give up control and hand over control of our behaviour so people can exercise their power over us
• learn acceptance of this from childhood

Question 8

What is a legitimate authority

Answer 8

• people we obey bc we perceive them to have authority over us
• justified by persons position on the social hierarchy and the power they have

Question 9

what is the agentic state?

Answer 9

• we feel no personal responsibility, because we believe we are acting for an authority figure
• frees of us the demands of our conscious and allow us to obey destructive authority figure

Question 10

Destructive authority

Answer 10

• problems= authority become destructive
• charismatic and powerful leaders can use their legitimate powers for destructive purposes

Question 10

Evaluation of agentic state strength: research support

Answer 10

• most of milgrams pp refused to give shocks at one point
• asked experimenter about the procedure
• ‘who Is responsible if the learner is harmed?’ ‘ im responsible’
• pp went through with little objections after
• when pp realized they weren’t responsible they acted as the experimenters agent easier

Question 11

Evaluation of agentic state limitation: a limited explanation

Answer 11

• doesn’t explain findings between Jacobson and Ranks study
• found 16/18 hospital nurses disobeyed orders from the doctors to administer too much of a drug to a patient
• almost all the nurses remained in the autonomous state
• agentic shift can only account for some situations of obedience

Question 12

evaluation of legitimacy of authority strength: explains cultural differences

Answer 12

• Kilham and mann (1974) found only 16% of Australian women went up to 450 V on milgram style study
• Man tell found 85% of German participants did
• in some cultures authority is more likely to be accepted as legitimate and entitled to demand obedience from people
  -shows diff ways people are raised to perceived authority figures

Question 13

evaluation of legitimacy of authority limitation: can not explain all (dis) obedience

Answer 13

• legitimacy cannot explain disobedience in hierarchy where there is a clear and accepted authority figure
• nurses were disobedient in a rigidly hierarchical authority structure
• some people are more or less obedient than others
• innate tendencies to obey or disobey have a greater influence on behaviour