Obedience to Authority

Question 1

What was the aim of Milgrim’s study?

Answer 1

Find out why so many Germans obeyed the Nazi command to slaughter 6mil in the Holocaust

Question 2

What was the sample?

Answer 2

40 males aged 20-50
Paid $4.50

Question 3

Where did the study take place?

Answer 3

Yale university in the Elegant Interaction Lab

Question 4

Who were the 3 types of people involved?

Answer 4

Experimenter, teacher, learner (confederate)

Question 5

What were the pps told the study was about?

Answer 5

Relation between punishment and learning

Question 6

Procedure

Answer 6

• Pps asked to read word pairs to the learner and punish them when they answered wrong
• Volts increased 15-450 (fatal)

Question 7

Why was there one real shock?

Answer 7

On the naïve pp to further convince the subject of authenticity of the generator

Question 8

What were the four comments used to keep the pps continuing?

Answer 8

• 1) Please go on
• 2) The experiment requires that you continue
• 3) It is absolutely essential that you continue
• 4) You have no other choice, you must go on

Question 9

What did 14 psychology professors predict the obedience would be?

Answer 9

Predicted only 3% would go to 450V

Question 10

What were signs of extreme tension observed on the pps?

Answer 10

• Sweat, tremble, stutter, biting lips
• Uncontrollable seizures in 3 pps

Question 11

How many pps stopped below 300V?

Answer 11

0

Question 12

How many pps stopped at 315V when the learner stopped responding?

Answer 12

4

Question 13

How many pps continued up to the fatal 450V?

Answer 13

26 (65%)

Question 14

Research (evaluation)

Answer 14

• Hofling 1966
• Asked doctor to phone 22 nurses telling them to administer a fatal dose
  95% began to obey before intervention
• Supports Milgrims work in the real world

Question 15

Ethics (evaluation)

Answer 15

• Deception (electric shocks)
• Not fully informed, no choice to leave, psychological damage

Question 16

Internal validity (evaluation)

Answer 16

• High levels of control
• However lacks internal validity (demand characteristics) if pps figured out shocks weren’t real they may administer the shocks anyway
• Only 1/2 pps believed shocks were real

Question 17

What are the situational variables that affect conformity?

Answer 17

• Proximity
• Location
• Uniform

Question 18

Proximity

Answer 18

• Learner placed in the same room as pp rather than behind a screen
• Obedience decreased to 40%

Question 19

Touch proximity

Answer 19

• Pp had to hold learner’s hand down onto the electrode to give the shock
• Obedience decreased to 30%

Question 20

Remote authority proximity

Answer 20

• Experimenter left the room and issued instructions by telephone
• Obedience decreased to 20.5%

Question 21

Location

Answer 21

• Moved away from Yale and conducted in a run-down office block in centre of town
• Obedience decreased to 47.5%

Question 22

Uniform

Answer 22

• Experimenter changed into normal clothes rather than a lab coat
• Obedience decreased to 20%

Question 23

What are the explanations of obedience?

Answer 23

• Legitimacy of authority
• Agenetic state

Question 24

Legitimacy of authority

Answer 24

• More likely to obey people we perceive to have authority over us
• Legitimised by position of power within social hierarchy

Question 25

Agentic state

Answer 25

- Agentic shift from autonomous individual (make own decisions based on perceived consequences of actions) to agentic state (instrument of authority, make decisions based on instruction) - Frees us from the demand of our consciences and allows us to obey even a destructive authority figure