Milgram's Study on Obedience (1963)

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  • Created by: RJH AS
  • Created on: 19-09-14 19:16
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  • Milgram's study of Obedience
    • Aim
      • To see if the participants would obey an authorive figure to administer electric shocks to somebody.
    • Precedure
      • Milgram selected participants by advertising for males to take part in the study-Volunteer sample.
      • The researcher would pick pairs out of the volunteers so they see who is the,,"Learner" or "Teacher".
        • The system was fixed so one partcicpant was "Teacher" all the time and the "Learner" was Milgram's collegues.
      • The learner was taken to a room, where there was electrodes and a shock generator with a scale from 15 volts to 450 volts.
      • The shock was only given if the learner gave an answer incorrctly.
      • After 180 volts the learner was in pain. After 300 volts the learner begged to be released and after 315 volts the learner was silenced. this is against withdrawal guildline and protection.
    • Results
      • Milgram predicted that only 2% would only go up to 450 volts but 65% participants did go to the highest level.
    • Evaluation
      • The study had high reliabilty because the variables were the same like the intructions for everybody so the study is more likely to be replicated with the same results.
      • The study lack ecological validity as delivering electrical shocks is not a realistic task that participants would carry out everyday.
      • Milgram deceived his participants by telling them that the aim was to test memory and learning.
        • He also made them believe the electric shocks were real. This is an ethical issue.
      • Participants also suffered psychological distress as many were visibly distressed and wanted to stop. But they have to continue on.
      • Participants were taken from a volunteer sample which it didn't represent the target population as only certain types of people would respond to the advert.
      • Participants would have not suffered demand characteristics because they weren't told the true aim of the experiment.

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