Social Influence: Situational Explanations

Question 1

What did Milgram propose in 1974??

Answer 1

Obedience to destructive authority occurs because a person believes that they aren’t responsible

Question 2

What are the autonomous and agentic states??

Answer 2

Autonomous - Acting independently and responsible for our own actions
Agentic - Following orders given by an authority figure so you’re not responsible for your actions

Question 3

What are the 3 reasons that people remain in agentic state??

Answer 3

• Binding factors (Aspects of the situation that allowed ppts to ignore the damaging effects of their behaviour
• Denying damage
• Shifting responsibility to victim

Question 4

What are the 3 main points when evaluating the agentic state??

Answer 4

• Research support (Most of Milgram’s ppts asked the Experimenter who was responsible and when told that the Experimenter was, they went through with it -> not responsible for actions -> agents)
• Battalion 101
• Rank and Jacobson (1977) found that most nurses disobeyed doctor’s orders to give patients an excessive drug dose (So agentic state doesn’t account for those who don’t obey)

Question 5

What happened with Battalion 101??

Answer 5

They were ordered to go from A to B and whilst doing so, they passed through a village and killed all civilians without being ordered to.

Question 6

What is legitimacy of authority??

Answer 6

The perceived right that authority has to do what they want to.
People obey authority based on their position in society

Question 7

Why can legitimacy of authority be negative?

Answer 7

Possibility that it can be used for destructive purposes -> Destructive authority

Question 8

Give a PEL example of evaluating legitimacy of authority.

Answer 8

P- Perceiving authority as legitimate varies form culture to culture
E- Kilham & Mann (1976) repeated Milgram’s original studying Australia (16%). Mantell replicated in Germany 1971 (85%)
L- Shows that authority is perceived differently in different countries

Question 9

Who repeated Milgram’s experiment, where and when?? (2 different examples)

Answer 9

Kilham and Mann (1976) in Australia
Mantell in Germany in 1971

Question 10

What’s a limitation of Legitimacy of Authority??

Answer 10

Some people did disobey in Milgram’s original study despite accepting the experimenter as an authority figure.
Innate tendencies towards disobedience may be more important than legitimacy of authority.