Milgram baseline study

Question 1

Aim

Answer 1

To discover levels of obedience when ppts were told to give electric shocks by an authority figure

Question 2

Sample

Answer 2

• 40 males aged 20-50
• recruited by mail and news adverts

Question 3

Procedure - before the actual procedure starts

Answer 3

• ppts drew a role from a hat
• Mr Wallace/confederate/learner (L) was receiving shocks - ppts didn’t know he was a fake ppt
• L strapped into electrode on the wrist and they were told it connected to a shock generator in the adjacent room - generator was fake
• generator went from 15-450v in 15v increments - T given sample shock of 45v to show its real

Question 5

Procedure - actual procedure

Answer 5

• Teacher (T) taken to adjacent room and told to read word pairs to L who had to memorise these and then repeat the word that went with the word that the T had said
• incorrect answers resulted in an electric shock which increased by 15v for every wrong answer

Question 6

What happened at 300v?

Answer 6

Mr Wallace banged on the wall - T told to continue the procedure

Question 7

Results

Answer 7

• 100% ppts went up to 300v
• 65% ppts went to the max 450v

Question 8

What were ppts behaviours?

Answer 8

Sweating, nervous laughter, trembles, stutters

Question 9

Conclusion

Answer 9

Situation is the most crucial factor which determines obedience levels and that is why obedience levels were so high - including taking place in Yale University and feeling obliged to continue the experiment despite it becoming unpleasant

Question 10

Strengths

Answer 10

• Reliability - standardised procedure - Mr Wallace was the same for each ppt, number and timing of his mistakes for the word pairs were the same - can check for consistency of results
• Validity - Milgram tested the true obedience of ppts - in a survey, 80% of ppts believed that the shocks were painful and showed signs of distress, such as sweating, which cannot be faked

Question 11

Weaknesses

Answer 11

• Ecological validity - giving electric shocks is not an example of a task which an individual would be asked to obey on a day to day basis - difficult to apply research to other situations, questioning the usefulness of results
• Ethics - ppts were deceived as they didn’t know Mr Wallace wasn’t actually receiving shocks - questions Milgram’s competence and ability to risk assess his procedure - problematic to recreate