milgram's situational variables

Question 1

what were his three situational variables

Answer 1

• proximity
• location
• uniform

Question 2

why did he conduct these type of variables agter doing his first test

Answer 2

to see if the variables create lesser or greater obedience

Question 3

proximity

Answer 3

• Originally the teacher and learner when adjoining rooms so the teacher could hear a learner but not see but in this variation, they were in the same room, obedience rate went from 65% to 40%

Question 4

what happened in a more dramatic variation for proximity

Answer 4

• touch proximity
• The teacher forced to learn his hand onto a electroshock plate when he refused to answer the question, obedience dropped to 30%

Question 5

What happened in the third variation for proximity

Answer 5

• remote instruction proximity
• Experimenter left the room and gave instructions to a telephone, obedience dropped to 20.5% and the participants frequently pretended to give shocks or gave weaker shocks

Question 6

location

Answer 6

-conducted a study in a random building rather than a prestigious university, experimenter had less authority, obedience felt a 47.5%

Question 7

uniform

Answer 7

• in the original baseline study, experimental wore a grey lab coat
• experimenter was called away due to an inconvenient phone call at start the procedure and the role of the experimenter was taken over by an ordinary member the public who wore everyday clothes(a confederate)
• obedience dropped to 20% (lowest of all variations)

Question 8

evaluation of situational variable

Answer 8

• supporting research, researcher found that when passerby were asked to perform actions by someone dressed as a security guard, more obedience here when compared to a milkman asking
• controlled variables closely, high validity established cause and effect
• pps may have worked out that the procedure was faked, obedience not truly measured