Social influence - Milgram's variations

Question 1

What were Milgram’s situational variations?

Answer 1

Location, proximity and uniform - (Bickman (1974) is covered as Milgram didn’t directly investigate this)

Question 2

Where was the original study conducted? Why?

Answer 2

Yale University - very prestigious institution to give ppts. confidence in the integrity of the research as institution carried legitimate authority

Question 3

How did he conduct the location variation?

Answer 3

He replicated the study in a run-down office block - obedience fell to 48%

Question 4

What are the 2 types of proximity variation?

Answer 4

• Teacher to learner (naïve ppt. to confederate)
• Experimenter to teacher (experimenter to naïve ppt.)

Question 5

What happened in the teacher to learner variation?

Answer 5

• When teacher and learner were sat in the same room, obedience rate fell to 40% as teacher could see harm they were causing and had more moral strain
• In ‘touch proximity’ variation, teacher had to force learner’s hand onto shock plate, obedience dropped to 30%

Question 6

What happened in the experimenter to teacher variation?

Answer 6

In ‘experimenter absent’ variation, experimenter gave orders over the phone and obedience rate dropped to 20% - some ppts. ‘cheated’, giving lowest shock level rather than following procedure

Question 7

What happened in the uniform variation experiment?

Answer 7

Bickman (1974) conducted a field experiment in NYC where confederates stood on the streets asking passers-by to perform small tasks. Outfit worn varied from suit to milkman to security guard.
Ppts. twice as likely to obey security guard (76%) compared to ordinary clothes (30%)
Uniform adds to legitimacy of authority to increase obedience levels

Question 8

What is a limitation of Milgram’s variations? - Might not have investigated all the situational factors affecting obedience

Answer 8

===> Research suggest culture is another. Kilham and Mann (1974) replicated Milgram’s experiment in Australia where only 16% went up to full 450V. Mantell (1971) found 85% obedience in Germany. Cross-cultural comparison shows different societies, different obedience levels, different hierarchical structure. Culture could play a more significant role in obedience than proximity, uniform etc.

Question 9

What is a strength of Milgram’s variations? - Real-life application

Answer 9

===> Kelman and Hamilton (1989) suggest My Lai massacre of 1968, where US soldiers killed 500 inhabitants of a Vietnamese village claiming they were obeying Lieutenant William Calley’s orders, can be understood in terms of power hierarchy and the role of uniform. Act of mass murder demonstrates people will blindly follow orders from an individual of higher perceived authority (emphasises power of uniform)