The Milgram Study (1963)

What was the psychology being investigated?

• Social pressure is the influence if a person or group on another person or group

• This might be orders, demanfs, or threats, but may also include social approval or reward.

• Conformity is the tendency to chance behavior, thoughts, or opinions to match a group.

  • Destructuve obendience has the potential to cause psych or physical harm or injury to another.

Social & Historical Context

• WW2 ended in 1945

• The behavior of the German people during the holocaust was analyzed

• 11 millin innocent people were systematically murdered by Nazis

• The Nuremberd laws

  • Took rights awaay from Jews in Germany (Jobs, marriage, ghetto, camps, etc.)

Background

• Milgram was a European Jew whose family fled to the U.S during WW1.

• Situational vs. Individual hypothesis?

  • Many believed in the Germans are different hypothesis (GADH)

  • They have a basic character defect: a readiness to obey without questiond.

• Milgram’s Hypothesis

• Milgram belived it was situational while many believed it was dispositional (GADH)

What was Milgram’s AIM?

• Would Ps follow destructive orders of an authority figure even if it meant harming another human being?

How large of an electric shock would Ps give a helpless man when ordered by a scientist in a lab wearing grey lab coat.

What was the research methods?

• Conducted in controlled setting at Yale Uni. but it’s not an experiment

• Pilot study using obs. / IV- NONE/ DV- Level of obedience

  • Operarionalized - how far on the shock degenerator they went

• Controls - same machine, same stooge, or confederate, recorded responses, same procedure.

Milgram’s Participants

• What kind of sample was it?

  • Volunteer sample

• How were the participants recruited?

  • Ad in the newspape

• What were they told was the aim?

  • Effect of punishment on learning

• How many Ps? Describe them.

  • 40 white men, aged 20-50 (blue & white collar)

• What compensation did they recieve? If only?

  • $4.50 was given for showing up not completing the study

What was the procedure?

1. Promised $4.50 even if didn’t complete study

2. Arrived at lab & introduced dto stooge or conederate (tought was another participant)

3. Told by experimented in a gray lab coat the purpose of study was to investigate punishment on learning and memory.

4. Drew slips for role of teacher or learner (it was rigged so participants was alwasy the teacher)

5. Stooge strapped onto chair & electrodes put on (Ps were shown machine & got test shock 45v)

6. Read word pairs and if wrong shcok increased by 15v while stooge played a recorder of responses

   • shock generator went up to 450 volts

7. Experimenter reads prods until Ps refused (defiant) or reached max volts (obedient)

   • “please continue” or “please go on”

   • “It is absolutely essential that you continue”

   • “You have no other choice, you must go on”

8. Participant debrief - interviewed & dehoaxed told this not real, no harm was done, and given real purpose of the study - obedience

Data collected

• Quantitative - How was it collectedd?

  • How high they shocked the learner

  • The survey question

• Qualitative

  • Observation of the Ps behavior and body language via one-way mirror and recording on video tape.

Quantitative results

• How many went to 255-300v (intense shcock)

  • 100%

• How many ent to the most severe 450v?

  • 26 were obedient 65%

• How many were disobedient?

  • 14 were disobedient 35%

Qualitative Results

• Describe observations made of Ps behavior during the study.

  • groaning,sweating, biting lips, stutterung, giggled nervously, 3 had seizures

  • Those that went to 450v were under extreme stress

  • extra prod was added to get them to continue: “Although the shock may be painful, there is no permanent tissue damage, so please go on.”

Conclusions

• People are more obedient to destructuve orders then belived possible

• People find the experience of recieving and obeying destructive order vert stressful

• Does this support the individual or situational hypothesis?

GRAVE evaluation

G - cannot generalize b/c there were no women and age range of 20-50, not very old or young