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SOCIAL INFLUENCE (2) - OBEDIENCE hit (Situational Variables prox…
SOCIAL INFLUENCE (2) - OBEDIENCE 
Social-psychological factors
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Evaluation
Strength - Legitimacy of Authority explanation accounts for cultural differences in obedience. Eg. Australia - 16% top voltage, Germans 85%
Limitation - Agentic shift doesn't account for behaviour of Nazis e.g.. German Reserve Police obeyed orders to shoot Polish civilians when not directly ordered, could choose to be assigned other duties. Not powerless to disobey.
Limitation - Agentic shift doesn't explain many of research findings so limited explanation. Eg. doesn't explain why some participants didn't obey.
Strength - Legitimacy of Authority can help to explain real-life crimes of obedience e.g.. My Lai massacre (Vietnam village where no threat but told may be) due to power hierarchy of US army - shot women & children
Strength - Agentic state explanation has some research support. Eg. students Class & Schmitt (2000) showed film of study & asked to identify who responsible for harm to learner. Experimenter blamed.
Agentic State
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Binding factors (such as shifting responsibility to victim or denying doing damage to victim) reduce moral strain of obeying immoral orders
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Situational Variables
Location
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Reduced obedience to 47.5% indicating experimenter had less authority in this setting but still high
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Proximity
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Touch Proximity Variation - when teacher had to force learner's hand onto electroshock plate obedience dropped to 30%
Remote-instruction Variation - when experimenter gave instructions by telephone obedience rate dropped to 20.5%
Evaluation
Other studies have provided research support for influence of situational variable on obedience e.g.. Bickman (1974)
Variations of original study may have lower internal validity due to extra manipulation leading participants to realise procedure faked
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Dispositional Explanations
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Evaluation
Limitation - Authoritarian Personality is limited explanation - pre-war Germany full of obedient, racist & anti-Semitic behaviour despite different personalities
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Limitation - much of the research is based on correlations with variables e.g.. authoritarianism had strong correlation with measures of prejudice against minorities
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Limitation - based on flawed methodology - F-scale has items worded in same direction, so can get high score by ticking same line of boxes down one side of page
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MILGRAM (1963)
Baseline Obedience Study - Milgram wanted to know why German population had followed Hitler's orders & killed 10 million Jews
Aims & Pro
Confederates played experimenter & learner (always "Mr Wallace"), "teacher" (participant) gave increasing shocks for mistakes
40 male volunteers, 20-50 years, with different occupations, paid $4.50 for study on memory - newspaper ads & flyers
If participant wished to stop, the experimenter had 4 standard "prods" e.g.. "Please go on", "The experiment requires that you continue", "It is absolutely essential that you continue" upto "You have no other choice, you must go on."
When got to level 300 volts, the learner pounded on wall & didn't respond to next question, after 315v pounded again then no further response
Findings
Prior to study, students estimated 3% might continue to 450 volts
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12.5% stopped at 300 volts, 65% continued to 450 volts
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Evaluation
Lacked internal validity - Orne & Holland (1968) argued participants didn't believe real electric shocks
Good external validity - relationship between authority figure (experimenter) & participant accurately reflected authority relationships in real life.
Replications have supported Milgram's findings e.g.. The Game of Death - French TV documentary replicated study
Alternative explanation - Social Identity Theory - obedience lies in group identification. Could identify with experimenter & science or victim
Ethical issues
Baumrind (1964) was critical of how participants deceived. Allocation of teacher & learner not random but fixed.
Sheridan & King - used real puppies with real shocks, lied to participants about nature of experiment 20/26 did maximum
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