Obedience Flashcards
What is an Agentic state?
Where people no longer feel responsible for their actions as they are acting for an authority figure.
What is an Authoritarian Personality?
Refers to a set of characteristics which are thought to increase the likelihood of an individual displaying obedient behaviour
According to Adorno what characteristics are needed to have an Authoritarian Personality?
- Conventionalism
- Authoritarian submission
- Authoritarian aggression
- Rigidity
- Cynicism
- Destructiveness
Two criticisms of Milgram’s study
Deception - Rigged choosing of role.
No representative - Small sample size (only men)
Two situational variable which effect obedience
Location and proximity
What happened in Bickman’s study?
Three confederates asked members of the public to engage in simple tasks. (Milkman - 47%, Security guard - 76% and ordinary clothes - 30%)
Moscovici’s Study
Moscovici gathered 32 groups of six females and told them they were taking part in a study on perception.
Each group were showed slides (of the colour blue with the shade intensifying each time)
The women were asked to identify the colour on the slide. Two of them were confederates in the conditions.
What were the confederates of Moscovici study conditions.
Consistent minority: They always said the slides were green
Inconsistent minority minority: They say the slides are green on two thirds of the occasions.
Moscovici’s Conclusions
Consistency is vital for minority influence to occur. If the minority consistently give the same answer they are more likely to sway a majority. 32% of participants conformed to the majority position on at least one occasion.
Moscovici - Private variation
More people conformed in the private study (where they had to write down their answers) - We could claim that it is a demonstration of the effect of social pressure (NSI)
What is minority influence?
Minority influence is where a small number of people reject the established view of the majority group.
Three important aspects of Minority Influence
Commitment
Flexibility
Consistency
Weaknesses of Moscovici study
Lacks mundane realism due to artificial nature of the task, not something participants would do in their day to day lives. usually are views are strongly held.
Sample was made up of entirely women, this creates sample bias as it means it cannot be applied to men.
Unethical as he deceived them 9told them they were doing a visual test) meaning they could not give fully informed consent.
What is the role of Buffers?
Used to escribe any aspect of a situation that protects people from having to confront the consequences of their actions.
