Social Influence - Obedience Flashcards
What are the situational factors affecting obedience?
- Proximity
- Location
- Presence of Allies
What are the results of Milgram’s study into obedience?
In the base-line study 65% of participants continued to the maximum voltage (450v). All participants continued to 300v and only 5 stopped at that point (12.5%), the point when the learner was first objected.
Evaluation - Ethical issues in obedience research.
Participants were uncertain about whether they had the right to withdraw, this uncertainty was caused by the experimenter and he insisted they should carry on and told them they have full responsibility for whatever happens to the learner so the teacher felt obliged to carry on with the experiment. (Baumrind)
Evaluation - low internal validity - lack of realism
Orne and Holland thought that part of the experiment would have been unbelievable. Despite the fact the learner cried in pain, the experimenter in Milgram’s studies remained cool and distant. This might have led to the participants no believing any real harm would have come to the learner. Meaning the research may lack internal validity because if the deception hadn’t worked then any conclusions drawn about why participants obeyed would be invalid.
Evaluation - Gender differences may have been overestimated.
We might expect to find gender differences in obedience, with women behaving more obediently than men. However, neither Milgram nor Blass (in a meta-analysis of obedience studies) found any difference in obedience rates between men and women. This shows that gender differences did not have an impact on obedience levels.
Evaluation - Milgrams research isn’t relevant to real-life.
Mandel claims that the situational factors Milgrams research says influence obedience do not occur in the real world. Despite, the presence of factors which would, according to Milgram, increase defiance, very few people refused to take part in a mass killing of Jews in Poland. This suggests that situational factors are not the only explanation for obedience.
Define the Agentic state
This is when we see ourselves as an agent for carrying out another persons wishes. When we move from seeing ourselves as responsible for our behaviour to seeing someone else as being responsible for it, ‘agentic shift’ has occurred.
Define Legitimacy of Authority.
A legitimate authority figure is someone who is perceived to be in a position of social control in a situation. For authority to be perceived as legitimate, it must occur within some sort of institutional structure, such as the military.
Why might the Agentic State occur?
The Agentic State may occur as a way of maintaining a positive self-image. Because behaviour is no longer our responsibility, our self-image is unaffected.
Evaluation - legitimate authority can be used to justify harming others.
When directed by a legitimate authority figure to engage in immoral actions, people are willing to do so. This unquestioning obedience to authority occurs no matter how destructive the actions that these orders called for. This is especially true in the military. This implies that when people authorise another person to make judgements for them about appropriate conduct, they no longer feel that their own moral values are relevant to their conduct.
Evaluation - People aren’t always in the Agentic state and can revert back to an autonomous state
When the participants considered the experimenter a legitimate authority, they underwent an Agentic shift, but reverted to an autonomous state afterwards. However, Lifton found that doctors at Auschwitz showed a gradual and irreversible transition from caring professionals to individuals who carried out evil acts. Therefore, carrying out evil actions over time may change people’s behaviour more that a sudden and reversible Agentic shift.
Evaluation - Plain cruelty might explain obedience better than Agentic shift.
Milgram’s participants may have used the situation to express their sadistic tendencies. The SPE results support this. Guards inflicted rapidly escalating cruelty to prisoners, even though there was no authority figure telling them to do this. This shows it may not be Agentic control which causes obedience. Instead it may be certain aspects of human nature.
