Milgram’s study
To investigate how obedient people would be to orders from a person in authority
that would result in harm to another person
More specifically, the aim was to see how large of an electric shock participants
would give to an innocent man ordered by the person of authority.
Method:
This study was not a lab experiment as there was no IV (instead it was a highly
controlled experiment)
The DV was the obedience of the participants; obedience being operationalised by
the voltage given in response to the orders
Forty men aged 20-50 from a range of different backgrounds we recruited by means
of newspaper advertisement from north America
Therefore volunteer sampling was used
Procedure:
Participants were promised $4.50 for every hour including 50 cent for travel
A man disguised as one of the participants (but was actually an actor) was working
for Milgrim in this experiment: He was selected because he was mild-mannered and
likable
Participants were naive as they did not know the true aim of this experiment (to
investigate obedience)
Each participant was individually introduced to this man and they were briefed on a
fake experiment based on the effect of punishment and were told that one would
play a teacher (naive participants) and one the learner (confederate)
The learner was then strapped into a chair and electrodes were attached to him
which connected to an electric shock generator which had a row of switches varying
from voltages of 15V to 450V with 15-volt intervals.
Each participant was given a 45V shock to demonstrate
A wall was placed between the teacher and the learner so only voices could be heard
The teacher (participants) would read out word pairs to test the learner
(confederate)
The procedure was administered by an experimenter, played by a biology teacher,
where he would order the teacher to give a shock whenever the learner made a
mistake (the shock getting 15V larger for every mistake)
The learner did not really receive shocks as it was a fake experiment, however, the
teacher did not know this
Up to 300V the learner did not respond to the shocks, but after, learner began
pounding on the wall ‘in pain’ and then became completely silent, suggesting he
was’dead’.
, They were then interviewed and asked how painful (out of 14) it was to give shocks
and that it was all fake
Results:
Both qualitative and quantitative data was used
The quantitative data being in the form of the average voltage that the participants
stopped at and number of participants giving each voltage
Qualitative data was gathered through comments, protests and body language (such
as sweating, lip biting, stuttering ect.) shown throughout the procedure
The average voltage given by the participants was 368V
100% of participants gave 300V or more and 65% gave the full 450V (only 1.2%
expected to go to 450V)
An average of 13.42 out of 14 for how painful it was to do
Conclusions:
People are much more obedient to destructive orders than expected
People find receiving and obeying orders highly stressful as the situation triggers a
conflict between two tendencies: obey those in authority or to not harm people
Some factors that affected high level of obedience may have been:
- Participants had volunteered so were obliged to participate properly
- The $4.50 payment
- Participants were ensured that shocks were not dangerous
- Learner appeared to be comfortable for the first 300V
- Study was done in a respectable environment at top university
Bocchiaro’s study
To investigate how obedient people would be to orders from a person in authority
that would result in harm to another person
More specifically, the aim was to see how large of an electric shock participants
would give to an innocent man ordered by the person of authority.
Method:
This study was not a lab experiment as there was no IV (instead it was a highly
controlled experiment)
The DV was the obedience of the participants; obedience being operationalised by
the voltage given in response to the orders
Forty men aged 20-50 from a range of different backgrounds we recruited by means
of newspaper advertisement from north America
Therefore volunteer sampling was used
Procedure:
Participants were promised $4.50 for every hour including 50 cent for travel
A man disguised as one of the participants (but was actually an actor) was working
for Milgrim in this experiment: He was selected because he was mild-mannered and
likable
Participants were naive as they did not know the true aim of this experiment (to
investigate obedience)
Each participant was individually introduced to this man and they were briefed on a
fake experiment based on the effect of punishment and were told that one would
play a teacher (naive participants) and one the learner (confederate)
The learner was then strapped into a chair and electrodes were attached to him
which connected to an electric shock generator which had a row of switches varying
from voltages of 15V to 450V with 15-volt intervals.
Each participant was given a 45V shock to demonstrate
A wall was placed between the teacher and the learner so only voices could be heard
The teacher (participants) would read out word pairs to test the learner
(confederate)
The procedure was administered by an experimenter, played by a biology teacher,
where he would order the teacher to give a shock whenever the learner made a
mistake (the shock getting 15V larger for every mistake)
The learner did not really receive shocks as it was a fake experiment, however, the
teacher did not know this
Up to 300V the learner did not respond to the shocks, but after, learner began
pounding on the wall ‘in pain’ and then became completely silent, suggesting he
was’dead’.
, They were then interviewed and asked how painful (out of 14) it was to give shocks
and that it was all fake
Results:
Both qualitative and quantitative data was used
The quantitative data being in the form of the average voltage that the participants
stopped at and number of participants giving each voltage
Qualitative data was gathered through comments, protests and body language (such
as sweating, lip biting, stuttering ect.) shown throughout the procedure
The average voltage given by the participants was 368V
100% of participants gave 300V or more and 65% gave the full 450V (only 1.2%
expected to go to 450V)
An average of 13.42 out of 14 for how painful it was to do
Conclusions:
People are much more obedient to destructive orders than expected
People find receiving and obeying orders highly stressful as the situation triggers a
conflict between two tendencies: obey those in authority or to not harm people
Some factors that affected high level of obedience may have been:
- Participants had volunteered so were obliged to participate properly
- The $4.50 payment
- Participants were ensured that shocks were not dangerous
- Learner appeared to be comfortable for the first 300V
- Study was done in a respectable environment at top university
Bocchiaro’s study
