Social Influence L5-8 Flashcards
Obedience
Behaving as instructed to by an authority figure - Investigated by Milgram
Authority Figures
Have power and status over others
Milgram Procedure (Investigation into Obedience to Authority)
- 40 participants were obtained through volunteer sampling.
- Carried out in Yale gave
- There was an experimenter and Mr Wallace who were both confederates. Mr Wallace claimed to have heart problems and was 47 years old
- Mr Wallace and the Naive Participant were told to pick a paper out of a hat which would determine whether they are a teacher or learner. Mr Wallace was always the learner
- The teacher (naive participant) was to punish the learner by giving a shock. Each time they got it wrong, the voltage would increased by 15v until 450v
- There were labels to indicate what the shock would do (moderate shock, lethal shock)
- Mr Wallace shouted, yelled and screamed in pain as he was shocked. He then went silent at 300v.
- Whenever the participant was asking to leave, the experimenter would stop them 4 times from leaving, telling them they must continue
Milgram Findings
100% gave shocks up to 300v
65% gave shocks to 450v
Participants were sweating and shaking because they were psychologically distressed.
Evaluation of Milgram’s experiment
- Unethical. Participants became distressed and were not protected from psychological harm. They experienced sweating, shaking because they thought they had killed Mr Wallace after he fell silent at 300v (-)
- Removal of right to withdrawal. Several participants had asked to leave but were prevented from doing so and therefore this violates their right
- The sample contained white American Males and cannot be generalised to the rest of the population. It therefore carries a gender and a culture bias.
- Participants were deceived. They were told the study was about memory and not about obedience. This means participants did not give their informed consent, but you can argue and say that this was needed to prevent any Demand Characteristics and other extraneous variables to come into play.
Situational Variables Affecting Obedience (Milgram and Bickman)
Proximity - When the learner was in the same room as the teacher, Obedience fell from 65% to 40%
- In the touch proximity variation, obedience fell from 65% to 30% (had to force Mr Wallace’s hand down)
- In the absent experimenter variation, it was found that obedience fell from 65% to 21%. Participants gave lower or no shocks when instructions were given over the telephone
Location - When the experiment was recreated in a rundown office by an experimenter. The obedience rates were then 48%. Participants found that it being carried out in Yale gave them confidence. Authority was higher in Yale
Uniform - They show status and what power you have. Bickman asked confederates to order passersby to pick up litter. Confederates in guard uniforms had 90% of passersby obeying them. Confederates that only wore smart clothes had 50% obeying them. Shows those wearing uniform were more likely to be obeyed
Agentic State and Evaluation
People shift from autonomy to the agentic state were they are under the control of an authority figure. They believe what they are doing is not within their control and instead the authority figures so they don’t feel guilty for their actions. Diffusion of responsibility. Buffers psychologically protect individuals from the consequences of their actions. These can be authority figures. Milgram found that the agentic state is needed within society to maintain hierarchies and prevent chaos.
Evaluation of Agentic State
+ Participants who were in the same room as Mr Wallace in Milgram’s experiment and with no buffers present (no protection from psychological harm) by being in close proximity, individuals did not enter the agentic state and they wouldn’t shock him
- Without buffers, people wouldn’t shift into the agentic state. However, Major Wilhelm Trapp’s battalion were ordered to kill a group of Jews. Even when there were no buffers, individuals decided to kill, despite being in close proximity and seeing the consequences of their actions.
Legitimate Authority and Evaluation
Legitimate Authority is another situational explanation for obedience. It states we know where we stand in the social hierarchy and obey those who are higher up than us. It is increased through proximity, location and uniform.
Evaluation
- Bickman found that those in guard uniform were more successful in asking passersby to pick up litter (90%) than those who wore casual smart clothes (50%).
- Legitimate authority doesn’t explain why only 65% of individuals in Milgram’s experiment were obedient and gave shocks up to 450v
- Hofling. He found when an unknown doctor called a nurse and told them to administer twice the maximum dose of a drug, 95% of the time, the nurse was obedient. This broke hospital rules and the doctor was unknown. Doctors have more legitimate authority than Nurses, so they were obedient
Dispositional Explanations of Obedience (Authoritarian Personality by Adorno)
Adorno proposed the Authoritarian Personality. These people were
- Conformist
- Hostile to those lower than them in status
- Servile to those higher then them in status
- People pleasing tendencies
People developed an Authoritarian personality through very strict parenting. They suppressed feelings of anger and resentment towards their parents and displaced them onto those weaker than them.
The F-Scale is designed to measure authoritarian personalities
Evaluation of Authoritarian Personalities (Dispositional explanations for Obedience)
- Authoritarian Personalities are rare. They cannot explain the 65% conformity in Milgram’s Experiment (-)
- Situational factors may be more important. When Mr Wallace made no sounds, obedience was 100% but when two authority figures were disagreeing, obedience was 0%. (-)
- Altemeyer found that there was a strong correlation between those willing to give high shocks to Mr Wallace and their results on the F-Scale. (+)
