Explanations for obedience - Agentic State

what does agency theory suggest ?

that were are socialised from young age to follow rules

what is it called when a person acts independently and takes responsibility for actions?

autonomous state

what is the opposite of autonomous state ? and what does it mean ?

• agentic state - mental state where no responsibility is felt for behaviour as actions re on behalf of an authority figure .

• individuals act as ‘agents’ who feel less moral strain and their conscience is freed

what is the the change from autonomous to state ? what does it mean ?

agentic shift

when someone is perceived as an authority figure and therefore has greater power because they have higher position in social hierarchy

what are binding factors ?

aspects that allow individual to reduce the damaging effect of their behaviour and therefore minimise moral strain

what examples of strategies used by participants to create binding factors ?

• shifting fault not the victim (foolish to volunteer)

• denying damage that was done to the victim

what is a strength of the role of agentic state on obedience ?

• milgrams studies support

• when participants resisted shocks they asked questions like “who is responsible if Mr Wallace gets harmed?” and the experimenter replies “im responsible” , participants continued

• no objections further

• they perceive they werent in control of their actions and acts more willingly as the experimenters agent

what is a weakness ?

• limited explanantion

• milgrams variations disprove agentic state

• Birney (2024) suggested that obedience varying in different situations was due to a product of the context rathe Ethan a natural tendency to obey

• agentic state doesn’t account for variation in obedience as seen in rates being 0-100%

• suggests that all features of the situation needs to be accounted for