social influence -> obedience: milgram situational variables Flashcards
What are situational variables in reference to obedience?
Focuses on external factors that affect the likelihood that someone will obey orders
What are the different variables Milgram investigated?
- Proximity
- Location
- Uniform
How did Milgram test the power of proximity?
- In Milgram’s original research, the Teacher and Learner were in separate rooms
- In the proximity variable, the percentage of participants who administered the full 450 volts dropped from 65% to 40%
What happened in the touch proximity variation?
- The Teacher had to force the Learner’s hand onto the ‘electroshock plate’ when he refused to answer a question
- In this condition the obedience rate dropped from 65% to 30%
What happened in the remote proximity variation?
Milgram also found that when the experimenter left the room and gave instructions to the Teacher by telephone, obedience levels fell to 20.5%
What is the effect of proximity on obedience?
Decreased proximity allows people to psychologically distance themselves from the consequences of their actions
What happened in the location variation?
- Milgram conducted his original research in a laboratory in the prestigious Yale University
- Milgram conducted a variation in a run-down office block
What did Milgram find in the location variation?
In this variation, obedience levels dropped from 65% to 47.5%, highlighting the impact of location in creating a prestigious atmosphere generating respect and obedience
What is the effect of location on obedience?
The prestigious university environment gave Milgram’s study legitimacy and authority
What did Milgram find in the uniform variation?
- In the baseline study, the Experimenter wore a grey lab coat as a symbol of his authority as it indicated his status as a uni professor or scientist
- Milgram examined the power of uniform in a variation where the Experimenter was called away and replaced by another participant (confederate), pretending to be a normal member of the public
What did Milgram find in the uniform variation?
Percentage of those who administered the full 450 volts shock dropped from 65% to 20%, the lowest of these variations
What is the effect of uniform on obedience?
Suggests uniforms ‘encourage’ obedience because they are widely recognised symbols of authority and increase the legitimacy of authority
Evaluation: Research support -> strength
- A strength is that there is research support for situational variables of uniform affecting obedience
- Bickman (1974) tested ecological validity of Milgram’s study by conducting a field experiment in a more realistic setting
- Three male confederates gave direct requests to 153 randomly selected pedestrians in New York
- Researchers dressed in one of three ways:
-> Guard’s uniform
-> Milkman’s uniform
-> Smart suit jacket and tie - People were twice as likely to obey the order given by the ‘security guard’ which supports Milgram’s idea that a uniform adds to the legitimacy of the authority figure and is a situational variable which increases obedience levels
Evaluation: Low internal validity -> limitation
- Original study criticised by Orne and Holland (1968) as it suggested that the participants guessed that the shocks were not real and therefore ‘real’ behaviour was not being measured
- Milgram gives evidence e.g. from post hoc interviews to suggest participants believed the set up
- It is more likely that the participants in some variations e.g. the proximity variation realised that this was not a real study and that they were being manipulated
- Therefore it is unclear whether the results of Milgram’s studies are genuinely due to the influence of operation of obedience or because the participants saw through the deception and responded to demand characteristics, lowering the internal validity
