Social influence - Milgram and obedience

Question 1

who studied obedience and when?

Answer 1

Milgram in 1963

Question 2

obedience

Answer 2

when an individual is faced with the choice to comply with an order from a member of authority, or to defy the order.

Question 3

why was Milgram interested in obedience?

Answer 3

after Nazi Germany - why was the holocaust designed? Eichman designed death camps and his defence was ‘I only followed orders’

Question 4

what did college students predict from the experiment?

Answer 4

they believed that only German people were obedient so they expected very few would go past 150 volts

Question 5

what were the results of Milgram’s experiment

Answer 5

65% of participants gave the full 450 volt shock

Question 6

who were the confederates/true participants in Milgram’s study?

Answer 6

the experimenter and the learner were confederates, the teacher was the true participant

Question 7

what affect did a change of location from Yale university to run down offices have on obedience?

Answer 7

obedience was 48%

Question 8

what affect did a change in proximity between the experimenter and teacher have on obedience?

Answer 8

obedience was 40%

Question 9

what affect did a change in touch proximity (forcing the learners hand onto the shock plate) have on obedience?

Answer 9

obedience was 30%

Question 10

what affect did the experimenter being absent have on obedience?

Answer 10

obedience was 21%

Question 11

what affect did social support have on obedience?

Answer 11

obedience was 10%

Question 12

what was female obedience compared to male obedience?

Answer 12

the same at 65% but women reported feeling more stressed

Question 13

what are the strengths of Milgram’s study?

Answer 13

+ real life application with the holocaust and Nazi Germany.
+ participants believed the shocks were real so high internal validity
+ Milgram’s experiment has been repeated many times in different countries and results have been similar
+ good external validity support. 1966, nurses obeyed doctor over phone to give 2x dosage of a drug than it says on the bottle
+ thorough and careful debriefing
+ right to withdraw was possible - 35% did so

Question 14

what are the limitations of Milgram’s study?

Answer 14

• ethical issues: no informed consent as they believed study was on learning, no protection of participants from psychological harm
• demand characteristics may have affected the internal validity
• over-generalised and oversimplified as an explanation for behaviour - should not be used as an excuse
• the confederates may have been seen as ‘unconvincing’ maybe influencing the way teachers acted