Agentic State & Legitimacy of Authority

Agentic State

Mental state where we feel no personal responsibility for our behaviour because we believe we are acting on behalf of an authority figure

Autonomous State

Individuals direct their own behaviour, taking responsibility

Agentic Shift

Moving from autonomous state into agentic state

What did obedient participants say in the interviews at the end of Milgram’s obedience experiment?

I wouldn’t have done it by myself, I was just doing what I was told

• Individual feels no responsibility for the actions that the authority dictates 

What is an explanation for why people adopt an agentic state?

To maintain a positive self-image

• Once someone enters the agentic state, the action done is no longer their responsibility - it no longer reflects their self image

• From the participant’s perspective, they are guilt-free

Legitimacy of Authority

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

• Justified by individual’s position of power within a social hierarchy 

• Participant allows authority figure to define the action’s meaning.

Destructive authority

Legitimate powers for destructive purposes

• For them to be perceived as legitimate, they must occur within some sort of institutional structure (e.g. uni, military) 

  • Doesn’t have to be distinguishable or reputable institution. 

DISC: Agentic State as loss of personal control

P: Fennis & Aarts (2012) claim that agentic shift is more likely in any situation where the individual experiences a reduction in their sense of personal control.

Ex: Under such circumstances people may show an increased acceptance of external sources of control to compensate for this.

Ev: Fennis & Aarts demonstrated that a reduction in personal control resulted not only in a greater obedience to authority, but also in bystander apathy, & greater compliance w. behavioural requests.

L: They conclude that the process of agentic shift isn’t confined to obedience to authority, but also may extend to other forms of S.I. where the individual feels ‘less in control of their actions’

AD1: Research support for agentic state

P: Agentic state can be supported by research evidence

Ev: Schmidt showed students a film of Milgram’s study & asked them to identify who was responsible for the harm to the learner. Students blamed experimenter rather than participant

Ex: Due to the experimenter’s legitimate authority as a scientist

L: Students recognised authority figure as cause of obedience, supporting this explanation

DIS1: Agentic state & real-life obedience

P: M’s claim that people shift between autonomous and agentic state fails to explain gradual & irreversible transition Lifton (1986) found in his study of German docs working at Auschwitz

EV: These docs changed gradually & irreversibly from ordinary medical professionals, concerned only w. the welfare of their patients, into men & women capable of carrying out vile & potentially lethal experiments on helpless prisoners

Ex: Staub (1989) suggests the experience of carrying out acts of evil over a long time changes the way in which individuals think & behave

L: In this way, notion of shifting between states may only account for some situations of obedience

DIS/DISC2: Agentic state or plain cruel?

P: A common belief among social scientists is that M had detected signs of cruelty among his participants, who had used the situation to express their sadistic impulses

EV: SPE. Within a few days, guards inflicted rapidly escalating cruelty on increasingly submissive prisoners, despite there not being an authority figure instructing them.

EX: Suggests that, for some, obedience might be explained in terms of agentic shift, but for others ‘obedient behaviour’ may be due to a more fundamental desire to inflict harm on others