Social influence
Explanations for obedience
Obedience - A form of social influence in which an individual follows a
direct order
- The person issuing the order is usually a figure of
authority, who has the power to punish when obedient
behaviour is not occurring
Milgram’s - Milgram (1963) pondered why such a high proportion of
original Germans supported Hitler’s slaughter of 6 million Jews in
obedience the Holocaust – were they more obedient?
study - His original study is known as the baseline study for the
variations that followed
Procedure
- 40 male participants aged 20-50
- A confederate acted as a ‘learner’ while the true
participant was the ‘teacher’ and there was another
confederate as the ‘experimenter’
- The teacher was required to give the learner an
increasingly severe electric shock each time they answered
a question incorrectly
- The shock level rose through 30 levels from 15 -450 volts
- If the teacher felt unsure about continuing, the
experimenter used a sequence of four standard prods,
ranging from ‘please continue’ to ‘you have no other
choice, you must go on’
Findings
- No participants stopped below 300 volts, 12.5% (5
participants) stopped at 300 volts and 65% continued to
the highest level of 450 volts
- Qualitative data – observations of extreme tension ‘sweat,
tremble, stutter, dig their fingernails into their hands’,
three participants even had ‘full-blown uncontrollable
seizures’
- Prior to the study, psychology students estimated no more
than 3% of participants would continue to 450 volts
- Participants were debriefed and assured their behaviour
was normal
Strengths Good external validity
- Although the study was conducted in a lab, Milgram argued
the lab environment accurately reflected wider authority
relationships in real life
- Other research supports this, e.g. Hofling (1966) studied
nurses in a hospital and found levels of obedience to
unjustified demands by doctors were very high with 21/22
nurses obeying
- This suggests that the processes of obedience to authority
that occurred in Milgram’s lab study can be generalised to
other situations, and so his findings have value to tell us
about how obedience operates in real life
, Social influence
Supporting replication
- The Game of Death was a French reality TV programme
which includes a replication of Milgram’s study
- Participants believed they were contestants in a pilot
episode for a new game show and were paid to give fake
electric shocks when ordered by the presenter to other
participants in front of an audience
- 80% of participants delivered to the max shock of 460 volts
to an unconscious man
- Their behaviour was almost identical to Milgram’s
participants – nervous laughter, nail biting and other signs
of anxiety
- This replication supports Milgram’s original conclusions
about obedience to authority, demonstrating that his
findings were not a one-off
Weaknesses Low internal validity
- Orne and Holland (1968) argued participants behaved
according to demand characteristics – they didn’t really
believe in the set-up, guessing it wasn’t real electric shocks
- Milgram was not testing what he intended to test meaning
the study lacked internal validity
- Perry’s (2013) research confirmed this as in tapes of
Milgram’s participants, many of them expressed their
doubts about the shocks
- HOWEVER, Sheridan and King (1972) conducted a similar
study where real shocks were given to a puppy – 54% of
males and 100% of females delivered what they thought
was a fatal shock
- This suggests that the effects in Milgram’s study were
genuine as people behaved the same way with real shocks,
with Milgram himself reporting that 70% 0f his participants
saying they believed the shocks were genuine
Ethical issues
- Baumrind (1964) criticised ways Milgram deceived his
participants as he led them to believe that the allocation of
roles as ‘teacher’ and ‘learner’ was random, but it was
fixed
- The most significant deception was believing the electric
shocks were real
- Signs of psychological harm – nail biting, anxiety, seizures
etc
- Baumrind objected as she saw deception as a betrayal of
trust that could damage the reputation of psychologists
and their research
Obedience: situational variables
Situational - Milgram identified several factors he believed influenced
variables the level of obedience shown by participants
Explanations for obedience
Obedience - A form of social influence in which an individual follows a
direct order
- The person issuing the order is usually a figure of
authority, who has the power to punish when obedient
behaviour is not occurring
Milgram’s - Milgram (1963) pondered why such a high proportion of
original Germans supported Hitler’s slaughter of 6 million Jews in
obedience the Holocaust – were they more obedient?
study - His original study is known as the baseline study for the
variations that followed
Procedure
- 40 male participants aged 20-50
- A confederate acted as a ‘learner’ while the true
participant was the ‘teacher’ and there was another
confederate as the ‘experimenter’
- The teacher was required to give the learner an
increasingly severe electric shock each time they answered
a question incorrectly
- The shock level rose through 30 levels from 15 -450 volts
- If the teacher felt unsure about continuing, the
experimenter used a sequence of four standard prods,
ranging from ‘please continue’ to ‘you have no other
choice, you must go on’
Findings
- No participants stopped below 300 volts, 12.5% (5
participants) stopped at 300 volts and 65% continued to
the highest level of 450 volts
- Qualitative data – observations of extreme tension ‘sweat,
tremble, stutter, dig their fingernails into their hands’,
three participants even had ‘full-blown uncontrollable
seizures’
- Prior to the study, psychology students estimated no more
than 3% of participants would continue to 450 volts
- Participants were debriefed and assured their behaviour
was normal
Strengths Good external validity
- Although the study was conducted in a lab, Milgram argued
the lab environment accurately reflected wider authority
relationships in real life
- Other research supports this, e.g. Hofling (1966) studied
nurses in a hospital and found levels of obedience to
unjustified demands by doctors were very high with 21/22
nurses obeying
- This suggests that the processes of obedience to authority
that occurred in Milgram’s lab study can be generalised to
other situations, and so his findings have value to tell us
about how obedience operates in real life
, Social influence
Supporting replication
- The Game of Death was a French reality TV programme
which includes a replication of Milgram’s study
- Participants believed they were contestants in a pilot
episode for a new game show and were paid to give fake
electric shocks when ordered by the presenter to other
participants in front of an audience
- 80% of participants delivered to the max shock of 460 volts
to an unconscious man
- Their behaviour was almost identical to Milgram’s
participants – nervous laughter, nail biting and other signs
of anxiety
- This replication supports Milgram’s original conclusions
about obedience to authority, demonstrating that his
findings were not a one-off
Weaknesses Low internal validity
- Orne and Holland (1968) argued participants behaved
according to demand characteristics – they didn’t really
believe in the set-up, guessing it wasn’t real electric shocks
- Milgram was not testing what he intended to test meaning
the study lacked internal validity
- Perry’s (2013) research confirmed this as in tapes of
Milgram’s participants, many of them expressed their
doubts about the shocks
- HOWEVER, Sheridan and King (1972) conducted a similar
study where real shocks were given to a puppy – 54% of
males and 100% of females delivered what they thought
was a fatal shock
- This suggests that the effects in Milgram’s study were
genuine as people behaved the same way with real shocks,
with Milgram himself reporting that 70% 0f his participants
saying they believed the shocks were genuine
Ethical issues
- Baumrind (1964) criticised ways Milgram deceived his
participants as he led them to believe that the allocation of
roles as ‘teacher’ and ‘learner’ was random, but it was
fixed
- The most significant deception was believing the electric
shocks were real
- Signs of psychological harm – nail biting, anxiety, seizures
etc
- Baumrind objected as she saw deception as a betrayal of
trust that could damage the reputation of psychologists
and their research
Obedience: situational variables
Situational - Milgram identified several factors he believed influenced
variables the level of obedience shown by participants
