Explanations for obedience - Agentic state & Legitimacy of authority & Authoritarian personality

describe agency theory

Milgram’s agency theory proposed that people operate on two levels

autonomous level = individuals behaving voluntarily and aware of the consequences of their actions, responsible

agentic level =individuals see themselves as the agents of others, not responsible for their actions

individuals will move between autonomous level and agentic level = agentic shift

define autonomous level

individuals behaving voluntarily and aware of the consequences of their actions, seeing themselves as responsible

define agentic level

individuals see themselves as the agents of others and not responsible for their actions

describe agentic shift

shift from autonomy to agency

if we obey an order that goes against our conscience, we are likely to experience moral strain, leading us to do something believed to be immoral to function as an agent of authority

Milgram believed this explained the behaviour of his pps = they denied responsibility and were merely “doing what they were told“

describe causes of agentic shift

e.g.binding factors = factors which keep us in the agentic state and make the “exit“ costs high

these are aspects of the situations that allow a person to minimise the damaging effects of their behaviour and reduce moral strain

also fear of appearing rude/arrogant in a social situation (e.g. in a lab exp)

also anxiety from challenging someone of authority

describe legitimacy of authority

people are more likely to obey people who we perceive to have authority over us

we obey authority figures because we are taught to trust them/because they have the power to punish us

one consequence of legitimacy of authority is that some people are granted the power to punish others = we are willing to give up some of our independence of our own behaviour to people trusted to exercise our authority

this authority is justified by the individual’s position of power in the social hierachy

one strength is research support for legitimacy of authority

Milgram’s location variation = obedience at prestigious university was 65%, obedience dropped when the location was a rundown office

the change of setting reduced the perceived legitimacy of authority/trust from the experimenter

Bickman (1974) field exp, 92% of pedestrians obeyed a stranger’s order to give them money for a parking meter when they were dressed as a security guard = 49% when dressed as a civilian

increases validity

one strength is research support for the agentic theory

Blass and Schmitt (2001) showed students film of Milgram’s original research and asked them to suggest who they thought was to blame in causing harm = blamed experimenter - suggests they believed the pps were agents of authority

students indicated the responsibility was due to legitimacy of authority = experimenter at the top of the hierarchy, hence obedience

explanation is supported by many historical events which show how social pressure can make normal people act inhumane

one strength is cultural differences in legitimacy of authority

Kilham and Mann found 16% obedience rate in Australians and an 85% obedience rate in Germans in a study like Milgram’s

the legitimacy theory is a useful account of cultural differences in obedience = authority is more likely to be accepted as legitimate in some cultures more than others

reflects how different societies are raised to perceive authority figures in different ways = supportive cross-cultural research = increased validity

describe authoritarian personality

dispositional explanation based on the idea that obedience is caused by the internal characteristics of an individual

proposed by Adorno et al as an explanation for people who held rigid, intolerant and conservative beliefs and were characterised by absolute obedience to authority/ domination of those of lower social standing

personality shaped in early childhood by parenting that focused on hierarchal and authoritarian parenting styles

children learn to obey authority through SLT

Adorno et al (1950)

investigated causes of an obedient personality

2000 middle-class, white Americans and their unconscious attitudes towards other racial groups = developed an ‘F‘ (fascist) scale to measure the relationship between a person’s personality type and prejudiced beliefs

those who had scored highly on the ‘F‘ scale identified with ‘strong‘ people and disapproved of the weak, were very conscious of their own and others’ status

higher scorers had a particular cognitive style = no grey areas between categories of people, fixed and distinctive stereotypes about other groups

strong positive correlation between authoritarianism and prejudice

identified the Authoritarian personality

define authoritarian personality

a distinct personality pattern characterised by strict adherence to conventional values and a belief in absolute obedience/submission to authority

state 4 characteristics of an authoritarian personality

rigid beliefs in conventional values

general hostility towards other groups

intolerant of ambiguity

submissive attitudes towards authority figures

one strength is research support for the authoritarian personality

Milgram and Elms (1966) conducted a follow up study using the original pps = found those who went up to 450V score higher on tests of authoritarianism and lower on scales of social responsibility than those who defied the experimenter

these findings support Adorno’s claims, however, only a correlation could be determined

lots of evidence to indicate that those who are very rigid, conservative, and prejudiced have been brought up in the way Adorno described (a lot of punishment, little chance to express own opinion)

cannot establish cause and effect relationship

one limitation is alternate explanations for obedience

social identity theory = people identify themselves as belonging to particular social groups = we favour our own group (in group) over any group to which we do not belong to (out group) = we maximise the similarities within the group/differences between out groups

most of the German people identified with the anti-sematic state and scapegoated the out group (the Jews)

one limitation is methodological issues with research about authoritarian personality

Milgram and Elms (1966)

self-report techniques = interviews vulnerable to interviewer bias as the interviewers knew the hypothesis of the study and were aware of what info they needed to confirm it

knowing the pps’ test scores meant the interviewers knew in advance whether the pp was likely to have an authoritarian personality = their questioning would have been guided by this knowledge = may have only recorded info needed to confirm hypothesis

biased sample (white, American males) = non-generalisable