Obedience

Social Identity Theory

________ suggests participants only obeyed when they identified with the scientific aims of the research and refused when asked to blindly obey.

Milgram Baseline Procedure

________: Milgram (1963) had 40 American men give fake electric shocks to a "learner "in obedience to instructions from the 'experimenter, 'thinking they were participating in a memory experiment.

Obedience

A form of social influence in which an individual follows a direct order

Milgram Baseline Procedure

Milgram (1963) had 40 American men give fake electric shocks to a "learner" in obedience to instructions from the 'experimenter', thinking they were participating in a memory experiment

Milgram Baseline FIndings

Every participant delivered 300V

Milgram Student Predictions

14 Psychology students predicted no more than 3% of participants would go to 450V

Milgram Participants Post-Experiment

All participants were debriefed and assured their behaviour was normal

Milgram Conclusions

Milgram concluded his American participants were willing to obey orders that might result in the harm of another person and that there are situational factors that encouraged obedience

Research Support (Milgram Baseline)

Beauvois et al (2012) replicated the experiment in a game-show fashion called Le Jeu de la Mort where participants were paid to give electric shocks to other ‘participants in front of a studio audience. 80% of participants delivered 460V to an ‘unconscious’ man but showed signs of anxiety.

Low Internal Validity (Milgrams Baseline)

Milgram reported 75% of participants said they believed shocks were genuine but Ome and Holland (1968) argued they didnt and were play-acting. Gina Perry (2013) listened to tapes of Milgram’s participants and reported only half believed the shocks were real and two-thirds of these were disobedient.

Sheridan + King (Milgram-related)

Participants (real students) gave real shocks to a puppy in response to orders from the experimenter and despite the real distress of the animal, 54% of men and 100% of women gave what they thought was a fatal shock

Conclusions may not be justified (Milgram-Baseline)

Haslam et al (2014) showed Milgrams participants only obeyed the first three verbal prods but all disobeyed the fourth prod that removed their choice