Situational Variables affecting obedience Flashcards
What was the aim of Milgrim’s Study?
Wanted to investigate whether ordinary people would follow the orders of an unfair authority figure. He wanted to test the hypothesis that the Germans who followed nazi orders were different; he hypothesised that anyone would have followed the orders put in the same position
What was milgrim’s method?
40 male participants, three roles in the experiment: the experimenter, the teacher, the learner. As far as the participant knew, they were fairly assigned the role of teacher through drawing lots. Participants were then told that they had to ask the learner questions and if they answered incorrectly they would have to administer electric shocks that would increase in voltage. So that the teacher realised what they would be doing to the learner they were given a test electric shock. The learner sat in another room and gave mainly incorrect answers. The learner remained silent until the 300 volt shock. At this point he didn’t respond to the next question and pounded on the wall instead and after that he said / did nothing. If the teacher would refuse to continue the experiment er would give some verbal prods
What did milgrim find in his study?
65% of the teachers went to the full 450 volt shock
100% of the teachers went to the 300 volt shock
Only 5/40 stopped at the 300 volt shock when the learner first objectified
14 out of 40 participants showed nervous laughing fits
All participants showed evidence of shaking sweating and stuttering
Many participants argued with the experimenter but continued to obey
What are there situational factors that affect obedience?
Proximity ( of authority figure and victim )
Location
Uniform
How does proximity of the victim affect obedience?
The percentage of people that obeyed the experimenter decreased from 65% to 40% when the learner was in the same room as the teacher. This was perhaps a result of the teacher being able to experience the learners distress more directly
How does proximity of the authority figure affect obedience?
When the experimenter was on the phone instead of in the room the obedience dropped from 65% to 21%. People were more likely to obey in the presence of an intimidating figure
How does location affect obedience?
Because the study was conducted at Yale University people were more reliant on the integrity of the study. When tested in a run down office in Connecticut obedience dropped from 65% to 48%
How does the power of uniform affect obedience?
Bushman carried out an experiment where a female researcher dressed in either a police uniform or a beggar stopped people in the street and asked them to give money to a male researcher for a parking ticket, 72% obeyed when she was wearing a police uniform and 52% obeyed when she was dressed as a beggar
What research supports milgrim’s findings?
Hofling et al studied nurses who worked in hospitals. Hofling rang the nurses pretending to be the doctor and asked them to give double the dose of a made up drug. If they did this they would be breaking several rules - giving twice the stated dose, taking orders over the phone and not having consent forms signed by the Dr. He found that 21/22 nurses obeyed hoffling and administered the drug. Thusly proving that people will obey legitimate authoritative figures
Why is milgrim’s research said to have internal validity?
As the experiment was carried out in a controlled laboratory the results have validity, as the environment is controlled milgrim would be able to rule out any extraneous variables. Also, with the study being controlled it means that the experiment is repeatable and reproducible which milgrim proved by carrying out the same experiment in different scenarios
Could participants have guessed the aim and acted due to demand characteristics?
Orne and Holland suggest that as the experimenter was cold and distant and showed no compassion for the screams of the learner, participants must have worked out that they situation was fake and this is why they administered the shocks; they knew they were not actually harming the participants, this would have been supported by the fact that electric shocks are not a believable punishment for getting a question wrong. This means that we cannot be sure that the iv is the thing that has affected the dv as it is possible that the participants guessed the aim and demand characteristics are the things that are causing their obedience
Why did milgrim underestimate the importance of individual differences in obedience?
A commonly held assumption is that women would be more susceptible to social influence than men (eagly) milgrim did not investigate obedience in women so could not identify any gender differences in his study. However it could be argued that there are a number of facts that need to be considered in milgrim’s research that may explain why some participants went up to 450v where as some didn’t e.g personality, upbringing
