social influence obedience: evaluation of social psychological factors

Question 1

what does it mean when we say the explanation of obedience (legitimacy of authority)had research support

Answer 1

Blass and Schmitt (2007) showed a film of Milgram’s study to students and asked who was responsible for harm to “Mr Wallace”.

The students blamed the “experimenter” rather than the participant. Students indicated that the responsibility was due to legitimate authority (experimenter was at the top of heirachy and therefor had legitimate authority)- also due to expert authority ( he was a scientist)

This explains legitimate authority as the cause of obedience, supporting this explanation

Question 2

what does it mean when we say the agentic state explanation has a limited explanation

Answer 2

The agentic shift doesn’t explain many of the research findings e.g. does not explain why some of the participants did not obey ( humans are social animals and involved in social hierarchies and therefore should have obeyed)

Furthermore, it does not explain findings of Hofling et al. Agentic shift explained why the nurses handed over responsibility to the doctor, but they should have shown levels of anxiety similar to Milgram’s participants, as they understood their role in a destructive process.

This suggests that agentic shift only account for some situations of obedience

Question 3

what is a strength of legitimacy of authority

cultural differences

Answer 3

legitimacy of authority explanation is a useful account of cultural differences in obedience

countries differ in degree to which people are traditionally obedient. This is proved in studies
e.g. Kilham and Mann (1974) replicated Milgram’s procedure in Austria. 16% of participants went all the way to the the top of voltage. This differs to German participants (85%)

This shows some cultures, authority is more likely to be accepted as legitimate and entitled to demand obedience from individuals. This reflects the way that different societies are structured and how children are raised to perceive authority figures

Question 4

what is one limitation of agentic sate ( obedience alibi)

Answer 4

there is research evidence to show that the behaviour of the Nazis cannot be explained in terms of agentic shift.

Mande (1998) described one incident involving German Reserve Police Battalion 101 where men obeyed the orders to shoot civilians in a small town in Poland - despite the fact they did not have direct orders to do so.

This suggests they did it on their own accord ( without legitimate authority)

Question 5

what is another strength of legitimacy of authority

Answer 5

legitimacy of authority can help explain real life war crimes e.g. Helman and Hamilton (1989) argue that the My Lai massacre can be understood in terms of the power heirachy of the US army