1.1.1 agency theory Flashcards
PSYCHOLOGIST
Milgram Stanley
DATE
1973
Agency theory
suggests that people have less free will than they suppose when it comes to decision making and shows how decisions that people think are personal to them are actually expressions of their social situation
Agentic shift
The transition between the agentic state and the autonomous state
autonomous state
state in which we perceive ourselves to be responsible for our own behaviour so we feel guilt for what we do
agentic state
in this state we perceive ourselves to be the agent of someone else’s will; the authority figure commanding us is responsible for what we do so we do not feel guilt.
moral strain
happens when an authority figure issues an order that goes against our conscience.
why does moral strain occur?
because we have two contradictory urges:
- to obey the authority figure (society’s expectations)
- to obey our conscience (keep our self image)
denial
ppts in Milgram’s study minimised the pain they were causing to the learner, convincing themselves that the shocks weren’t dangerous.
avoidance
many ppts tried not to look at the experimenter or even look up from the shock generator
degree of involvement
some ppts only flicked the switches on the generator lightly, as if this would somehow lessen the pain
helping the learner
other ppts tried to help the learner by stressing the correct answer on the memory test in variation 7
What were Milgram’s explanations of the agentic shift?
- Survival trait - enabled early humans to flourish. Early humans who were disobedient did not survive the dangers of the prehistoric world.
- conditioning- from an early age we are conditioned to respect authority figures. We are rewarded when we are respectful and punished when we disobey.
Real life examples of agency theory
- Milgram’s 1963
- WWS
- Mai Lai massacre
- Hofling’s nurses study
