AQA Psychology A level Social Influence - Outline and evaluate research into obedience (16 Marks)

What the spec says: Explanations for obedience: agentic state and legitimacy of authority, and situational variables affecting obedience including proximity, location and uniform, as investigated by Milgram.

For this topic it's really important to read the question carefully to see specifically what it's asking you. If the question says 'Discuss research into obedience', then mention Milgram's main study either in depth on its own or talk about it briefly alongside another study such as Hoflings. If, however, the question asks for 'EXPLANATIONS into obedience', then talk specifically about the explanations and not just the studies.

OUTLINE AND EVALUATE RESEARCH INTO OBEDIENCE

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A study into obedience was conducted by Milgram to investigate how far ordinary people would go in obeying an instruction from an authority figure if it meant harming another person. He obtained 40 male volunteer pps who were deceived by being told they were taking part in a study investigating learning and punishment and invited to the Yale university lab. At the beginning of the study, they were introduced to an experimenter in a white lab coat (played by an actor) and another pp - Mr Wallace - who was a confederate. Pps had to draw straws to determine their roles of either teacher or learner however this was fixed and the confederate was always the learner. Pps were told they could leave the study at any time. They were placed in separate rooms with the real pp in a room with a shock generator and was instructed to give increasingly severe shocks each time the learner answered incorrectly. The learner was strapped to a chair in another room with electrodes and had to learn a list of paired words and recall its pair. The real pp was given a real shock of 45V to prove its authenticity but thereafter the shocks weren't real. The learner purposefully gave mainly wrong answers and was given an increasing shock for each, starting at 15V (slight shock) up to 450V (severe shock). 100% of pps went up to 300V in which no verbal feedback was given by the learner other than a bang on the wall and 65% of pps went to 450V. Pps were instructed to continue in such circumstances and when they turned to the experimenter for guidance, they were given a series of verbal prods e.g "you must continue" and "you have no choice but to continue".

[Additional AO1 info] Qualitative data was also collected such as observations that pps showed extreme tension as many were seen to sweat and stutter with 3 pps having 'full-blown uncontrollable seizures'. Prior to the study, Milgram asked 14 students to predict the behaviour of pps. They estimated that no more than 3% would go up to 450V which shows that the findings were unexpected.

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Support for Milgram’s study comes from The Game of Death documentary about reality tv which includes a replication of Milgram’s study. The pps believed they were contestants in a pilot episode for a new game show. They were paid to give fake electric shocks when ordered by the presenter to other pps (who were actors) in front of a studio audience. 80% of pps delivered the max shock of 460v to an unconscious man. Their behaviour was almost identical to that of Milgram’s pps eg nervous laughter and biting nails. This study therefore supports Milgram’s original conclusions about obedience to authority and shows that his findings weren’t just a one-off chance occurrence.

One of the most important criticisms of Milgram’s work was its ethics. Baumrind criticised the study as unethical as the pps were deceived into thinking it was a study of learning, with the most significant deception involving the pps believing the electric shocks were real. Baumrind objected the study because she saw deception as a betrayal of trust that could damage the reputation of psychologists and their research. Milgram’s study also abused the right of pps to withdraw and those wishing to leave were told to continue using prods from the experimenter. This further caused distress to pps as 3 of them had violent seizures and all could’ve suffered psychological damage such as guilt and low self-esteem. This is unethical as he had not taken fully informed consent from pps and it may have meant that participants were leaving themselves vulnerable to psychological harm, because they didn’t know what the procedure involves, thus failing to protect them. However, Milgram defended himself on ethical grounds by arguing that the pps could’ve left the study and weren’t physically restrained. Furthermore, all pps were debriefed and reassured that the learner was unharmed and hadn’t received any shocks. Milgram also completed a follow up survey a year later and found that 84% were glad to have taken part with 80% saying there should be more studies like Milgram’s and 75% said they had learnt something of personal value about themselves. This suggests that the benefits of Milgram’s study may have outweighed the costs in the LT as his research has contributed significantly to understanding the behaviour of Nazis and the explanations of why people obey even when harming others.

Orne and Holland argued that pps' behaved the way they did because they didn’t believe the shocks were real in which case Milgram wasn’t testing what he intended to test suggesting the study lacked internal validity. Perry’s (2013) recent research confirms this as she listened to tapes of Milgram’s pps and reported that many of them expressed their doubts about the shocks. However, Sheridon and King conducted a similar study where real shocks were given to a puppy. Despite the real shocks, 54% of male student pps and 100% of the females delivered what they thought was a fatal shock. This would therefore support Milgram’s study and the behaviour of pps because people behaved the same way with real shocks. This is further supported by Milgram reporting that 70% of pps believed the shocks were genuine.

Although Milgram’s study may appear to lack external validity due to being conducted in a lab, the central feature of this situation was the relationship between the authority figure and the pps which Milgram argued reflected wider authority relationships in real life. For example, Hofling et al studied nurses on a hospital ward and found that levels of obedience to unjustified demands by a fake doctor such as giving patients a drug in an amount which was clearly an overdose were very high (21/22 nurses obeyed). This suggests that the processes of obedience to authority that occurred in Milgram’s study can be generalised to other situations which shows us how obedience operates in real life.

Milgram’s study also has low historical validity as it was conducted a long time ago and the results generated may simply reflect that particular time period. Society has become more independent suggesting that people may be less likely to obey if it meant harming another person. This may also be a result of being more aware of the consequences of our actions as the media makes such news available to everyone. Thus, the results in this study may no longer be generalised to the modern-day population.

Useful links:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGxGDdQnC1Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOUEC5YXV8U

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBYVYrMflwI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfqAQ-RZDTs