Obediance

Question 1

Define obedience

Answer 1

Complying with demand of an authority figure

Question 2

Main study for obedience

Answer 2

Milgrams study on obedience

Question 3

Aim

Answer 3

To see how obedient people would e in a situation where obeying order would be breaking their moral code

Question 4

Procedure

Answer 4

• 40 American men aged 20-50
• ppts told they where taking part in a memory test bout the effects of punishment of learning
• ‘mr wallace’ a confederate that appeared to be a ppt
• real ppl was always teacher and confederate always learner
• mr Wallace strapped to a chair behind a screen
• ppts tested memory of word pairs
• experimenter ordered ppts to give a shock to mr Wallace if he answered wrong
• unknown to ppts shocks where not real
• levels of shock increased mr Wallace cried out in pain and at 450 v he went silent
• when ppts protested, experimenter gave them a series of verbal prods

Question 5

Findings

Answer 5

• 62.5% gave shocks up to 450V
• every ppt gave t least 300V
• most ppts became highly distressed = 3 having seizures
• some showed few signs of discomfort

Question 6

Conclusion

Answer 6

• ppl have strong tendencies to obey order even when these go against their morals
• most ppl will kill or injure a stranger when ordered to by authority
• however ppl become very distressed when obeying order that breach moral codes

Question 7

Strengths

Answer 7

High reliability

• easy to replicate
• produce similar results
• lab experiment

-practical value in helping us to understand events such as the Holocaust.

Question 8

Limitations - ethical issues

Answer 8

Ethical issues
- Baumrind (1964) argued that Milgram showed insufficient respect for his participants and that there were inadequate steps taken to protect them. She also suggested that his procedures had the potential to cause long-term psychological harm and that there was the likelihood that participants would not trust psychologists or people in authority in the future.

Question 9

Limitations

Answer 9

• too artificial and had little resemblance to real-life situations where obedience is required. It therefore lacked ecological validity and may not tell us anything about obedience in other situations.
• lacked population validity. Participants were all male Americans and so the findings and conclusions about obedience levels may not be generalisable to females and non-Americans.