Bocchiaro Flashcards
Key theme
Responses to an authority figure
What is the study on?
The dynamics of disobedience and whistle-blowing.
(disobedience towards unjust authority)
Background
Milgram’s research showed that people are highly obedient to authority figures even when they know what is asked of them is unethical.
But there is little understanding of the nature of disobedience, Bocchiaro attempted to study the EXTENT to which individuals DISOBEY authority and even WHISTLEBLOW.
Central to this and Milgram’s study is the idea of UNJUST authority. If an authority figure makes a reasonable request it makes sense to follow it.
Unjust authority
Gives instructions which require a person to behave in an antisocial way towards others- e.g giving an electric shock.
Whistle blowing
This involves informing the authorities about unethical practice in a particular unethical professional practice.
Pilot study
A trial run of a research study, involving only a few ps who are representative of target population. Conducted to test any aspect of the research design, with a view to making improvements before conducting the full research study.
Aim
aimed to investigate HOW people deal with unethical and unjust request, ps have option of obeying, disobeying or ‘blowing the whistle’.
what did it also aim to do?
replicate Milgram’s findings of a wide gap between people’s predictions of their own and others degree of obedience when contrasted with the actual behavioural outcomes in his experiment.
finally the study aimed to…
see if people who disobey/whistle-blow show different personality characteristics than those who don’t.
Sample
149 university undergrads took part in main procedure in exchange for either 7 euros or course credits.
96 women
53 men
mean age 20.8 years old.
11 ps were removed as they were ‘suspicious’ of the study.
sampling technique
self-selected sample
how he gained sample?
using flyers posted in a university café
sample of pilot tests
92 university students of Amsterdam took part in pilot tests
138 ‘comparison’ students from the VU university were provided with a detailed description if experimental setting
138 comparison students were asked…
“what would you do?”
“what would the average student at your university do?”
Pilot tests
series of 8 pilot tests were conducted prior to main study
what did the pilot tests check?
-if procedure was believable
-if procedure was morally acceptable
-experimenter-authority behaviour was standardised.
Materials used
1- a research committee ethics form
2- two personality tests
2 personality tests
1- HEXACO-PI-R
2- Decomposed Games measure
HEXACO-PI-R
To asses 6 personality traits;
honesty, humility, emotionality, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness to experience.
ps indicated agreement with each item on a 5-point Likert scale.
Decomped Games measure
Assesses how much importance a person places on the welfare of another person in relation to their own welfare, called social value orientation (SVO).
Enables ps to be categorised as;
prosocial, individualistic or competitive.
how many ps in main study?
149 students
start of procedure
Each ps reported to a psychology lab where they were greeted by a dutch male experimenter (authority figure)
Experimenter asked if ps could provide the names of a few fellow students and explained this with a cover story
COVER STORY said by experimenter:
-research was on sensory deprivation
-previous ps reported experience as frightening
-needed college students to take part
-uni research committee is evaluating whether to approve the study
-it would help if you could convince the students you named to take part
it would also help if you could convince research committee that study is ethical so they will approve it.
After experimenter explained cover story, he left for 3 mins to allow ps to reflect. Returned and further said:
- We’ll move into the next room where you can fill in the statements for your friends and the form for the research committee.
-You must be enthusiastic in writing your statement, please use at least 2 of the following words; exciting, incredible, great, superb.
-Please do NOT mention the negative effects of sensory deprivation.
Ps were then lead to a 2nd room- what was in this room?
a computer to write the report, the research committee form, and a mailbox where ps can anonymously post the form.
experimenter then left the room for how long?
7 minutes
experimenter asked each ps to fill in what?
2 personality tests
how long did entire session last?
40 mins
debrief
all ps were carefully debriefed, with special attention paid to understanding the need for deception.
experimenter
played by a confederate, stern manner, formally dressed, dutch male.
survey results based on the comparison study of 138 ps (asked what they would do and what average student would do)
3.6% believed they personally would OBEY
64.5% believed they would WHISTLEBLOW
31.9% believed they would DISOBEY
—————————————————–
18.8% believed average student would OBEY
43.9% believed the average student would DISOBEY
37% believed the average student would WHITSLEBLOW
STUDY RESULTS
76.5% OBEYED
14.1% DISBOEYED
9.4% WHISTLEBLEW (6% of these had also OBEYED-filled out research committee form)
dispositional factors
-There were NO significant differences between ANY of the 3 groups of ps in terms of ANY of the 6 personality factors measured by HEXACO-PI-R.
-Social value orientation was NOT associated with obedience, disobedience or whistleblowing. (extent to which personal values are oriented toward benefit for ALL or just the SELF).
-There were NO significant differences in terms of gender or religion.
-There WAS a significant trend with regard to faith (a confident belief in transcendent reality) whistle-blowers tended to have MORE FAITH than obedient or disobedient ps.
each ps either obeyed or disobeyed what?
the request to write a statement supporting the sensory deprivation study.
each ps also either blew the whistle or not, ‘blowing the whistle’ means?
that the ps filled in the RESEARCH COMMITTEE FORM
a person who obeyed the whistle was …
An anonymous whistle blower
a person who disobeyed and blew the whistle was…
An open whistle blower.
how many ps BLEW THE WHISTLE?
14
5 of these 14 ps were…
open whistle blowers
open whistle blowers did what?
filled in ethics form and refused to write supporting statement.
conclusions
-people are VERY OBEDIENT and WHISTLEBLOWING is UNCOMMON.
-people OVERESTIMATE the tendency to blow the whistle & UNDERESTIMATE the likelihood of obedience.
-There is little or NO evidence to suggest that dispositional factors affect obedience or whistle blowing.
-On a theoretical level results support the findings of prev research showing; we tend to see ourselves as ‘special’ and rate ourselves as LESS likely to follow destructive orders.
-Results have implications for social psy research. Inaccuracy of estimates of behaviours in this situation suggests all scenario-based research LACKS VALIDITY.
Gist of cover story
Experimenter & italian colleague were investigating effects of sensory deprivation on brain function.
A recently conducted experiment on 6 ps in ROME who spent their time completely isolated, unable to see or hear had disastrous effects; all panicked, cognitive abilities were temporarily impaired, some hallucinated. 2 ps had to stop due to strong symptoms but weren’t allowed to as invalid data may have been collected. Majority said it was frightening.
Experimenters wanted to replicate study at VU uni using college students as there was no data on young people-some scientists thought their brains may be more sensitive to negative effects of isolation.
A university research committee was evaluating to approve or not and were collecting feedback from students who knew details about experiment to help aid decision, ps were told research committee forms were in next room.
Ps were asked to write statement convincing students they previously indicated to take part in experiment, statements would be sent to the identified students via mail.
