Situational factors which influence obedience
- Created by: maddieecarr
- Created on: 07-04-22 14:28
View mindmap
- Situational factors influencing obedience
- Uniform
- Definition: people in positions of power often have a specific outfit which is symbolic of their authority. This indicates who is entitled to expect obedience
- Milgram’s variations
- Plain clothed person who replaced a lab-coated experimenter gave the instructions
- 20% obedience rate
- Plain clothed person who replaced a lab-coated experimenter gave the instructions
- Location
- Definition: the place where an order is issued. The status/prestige of the location often effects obedience levels.
- Milgram’s variations
- Changed the location from prestigious Yale university to a run down office block in NJ
- 47.5% obedience rate
- Changed the location from prestigious Yale university to a run down office block in NJ
- Proximity
- Definition: the physical closeness or distance of an authority figure to the person they are giving an order to.
- Milgram’s variation
- Teacher had to force the learner’s hand onto a shock plate
- 30% obedience rate
- Experimenter gave instructions over the phone
- 20.5% obedience rate
- Teacher had to force the learner’s hand onto a shock plate
- Evaluating the situational variables
- Weaknesses
- Western-centric as it only applies to western countries
- Offensive to suggest these are valid reasons for an individual obeying orders in the Holocaust etc
- Poor internal validity as the participants seemed to be aware that the shocks were fake
- Strengths
- Research support from Bickman showed importance of uniform: e.g. participants twice as likely to respond to the security guard than a man in a suit
- Milgram’s variations had good control of variables which meant there were no extraneous variables affecting the data
- Can be applied across cultures
- Weaknesses
- Uniform
Comments
No comments have yet been made