1.1.7

Obedience

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Influence for Milgram's Experiment

Milgram's (1963) study demonstrates the phenomenon of obedience.

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Obedience

  • Obedience is the change of an individual’s behaviour to comply with a demand by an authority figure.
  • People often comply with the request because they are concerned about a consequence if they do not comply.
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Inspiration for the experiment

  • Stanley Milgram was a social psychology professor at Yale who was influenced by the trial of Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi war criminal.
  • Eichmann’s defence for the atrocities he committed was that he was “just following orders.”
  • Milgram wanted to test the validity of this defence.

Milgram's Experiment

This classic experiment by Milgram (1963) demonstrates the phenomenon of obedience.

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Method

  • Milgram recruited 40 male volunteers who were led to believe that they were participating in a study to improve learning and memory.
  • The participants were shown how to use a device that they were told delivered electric shocks of different intensities to the learners.
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Method cont.

  • The participants were told to shock the learners if they gave a wrong answer to a test item - that the shock would help them to learn.
  • Shocks were increased in 15-volt increments up to 450 volts.
  • The participants did not know that the learners were confederates and that the confederates did not actually receive shocks.
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Results

  • In response to a string of incorrect answers from the learners, the participants obediently and repeatedly shocked them.
  • The confederate learners cried out for help, begged the participant teachers to stop, and even complained of heart trouble.
  • Yet, when the researcher told the participant-teachers to continue the shock, 65% of the participants continued the shock to the maximum voltage and to the point that the learner became unresponsive.
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Variations

  • Several variations of the original Milgram experiment were conducted to test the boundaries of obedience and when certain features of the situation were changed, participants were less likely to continue to deliver shocks:
    • When the setting of the experiment was moved to an office building, the highest shock rate dropped to 48%.
    • When the learner was in the same room as the teacher, the highest shock rate dropped to 40%.
    • When the teachers’ and learners’ hands were touching, the highest shock rate dropped to 30%.
    • When the researcher gave the orders by phone, the rate dropped to 23%.
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Relationship with humanity and authority

  • These variations show that when the humanity of the person being shocked was increased, obedience decreased.
  • Similarly, when the authority of the experimenter decreased, so did obedience.

Jump to other topics

1Social Influence

2Memory

3Attachment

4Psychopathology

5Approaches in Psychology

6Biopsychology

7Research Methods

8Issues & Debates in Psychology (A2 only)

9Option 1: Relationships (A2 only)

10Option 1: Gender (A2 only)

11Option 1: Cognition & Development (A2 only)

12Option 2: Schizophrenia (A2 only)

13Option 2: Eating Behaviour (A2 only)

14Option 2: Stress (A2 only)

15Option 3: Aggression (A2 only)

16Option 3: Forensic Psychology (A2 only)

17Option 3: Addiction (A2 only)

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