Social (AS)

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Social Summary

Key Assumptions:

  • Other people and the environment influence our behaviour and thought processes
  • All human behaviour occurs in a social context (even in the absence of others)
  • Our relationships with others influence our behaviour and thought processes

Agency Theory - Entering an agentic state and doing something unethical because of a legitimate authority figure.

Agentic State - Expecting authority to take responsibility for your actions.

Autonomous State - Taking responsibility for your own decisions ad actions.

Conformity - Doing what everyone else is doing

Obedience - Doing what you have been told by an authority figure.

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Milgram - 1

Aim: To investigate what level of obedience would be shown when participants were told by an authority figure to administer electric shocks to another person. Ofter described as the 'Germans are different' hypothesis.

Research method: Whilst Milgram claimed that it was an experiment, it was actually a controlled observation.

Sample: 

  • 40 males
  • Between 20 and 50 years of age
  • From the New Haven area

This is a self-selected sample as they responded to a newspaper and mail advertisement which asked for volunteers to participate in a study of memory and learning at Yale university. They were paid $4.50 for their participation.

This sample is androcentric as it is all male.

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Milgram - 2

Confederates: 

  • The experimenter was played by a 31 year old biology teacher, who introduced himself as Jack Williams. He wore a technician's coat and appeared stern and emotionless.
  • The victim was played by Mr Wallace, a 47 year old accountant, trained for the role, which most participants reported was mild-mannered and likeable.

Procedure:

  • The study took part at Yale University and they were told the study aimed to see how puishment affected learning.
  • The 'naive' volunteer was introduced to the other 'participant' and then lots were drawn for the parts of teacher and learner. The true participant always got the role of the teacher.
  • The learner was then strapped into an electric chair and the teacher had a test shock of 45v.
  • The teacher read out questions to the learner and with each wrong answer the teacher had to administer seemingly real electric shocks, increasing by 15v each time.
  • At 300v, the learner pounded the wall, then again at 315. After this they stopped responding.
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Milgram - 3

If the participant showed some form of indication that they didn't want to continue, he would be given encouragement by the experimenter with a series of standardised prods:

  • Prod 1 - 'Please continue' or 'Please go on'
  • Prod 2 - 'The experiment requires that you continue'
  • Prod 3 - 'It is absolutely essential that you continue'
  • Prod 4 - 'You have no choice, you must go on'

If the participant asked if the learner could suffer permanent physical injury, a special prod was used, 'Although the shocks may be painful, there is no permanent tissue damage, so please go on'

If the participant said that the learner did not want to go on, another special prod was used, 'Whether the learner likes it or not, you must go on until he has learned all the word pairs correctly, so please go on'

Participants were observed by the experimenter and by observers from behind a one way mirror.

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Milgram - Results and Conclusions

Results:

  • All 40 participants obeyed up to 300v, at which point 5 refused to continue.
  • Overall, 65% of the participants gave shocks up to 450v (Obeyed) and 35% stopped sometime before 450v (Disobeyed).
  • In the post-experimental interview, participants were asked 'How painful to the learner were the last few shocks you administered to him?' On a printed 14 point scale from 1 being not at all painful to 14 being extemely painful, the mean score was 13.42.
  • Many participants showed signs of nervousness and tension e.g. sweating and trembling

Conclusions:

  • There is no such thing as an obedient type and that in the right situation we will all enter an agentic state and obey orders.
  • German's are not different, situational factors cause obedience as we are socialised to accept the possibility of consequences when we disobey.
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Milgram - Evaluation

Strengths:

  • Standardised procedure, so higher in internal reliability.
  • High controls over extraneous variables e.g. all 4 prods were the same. Therefore it is higher in validity.
  • Collects both qualitative and quantitative data, allows for objective comparisons and gives reasons behind behaviour.
  • Sample is very similar to Nazi soldiers, allows for valid comparisons.

Weaknesses:

  • Many ethical issues broken, e.g. PoP as they showed signs of nervousness and tension.
  • Low in ecological validity as the task is very extreme and it isn't the participants natural environment.
  • Snapshot study so you can't see the development of behaviour over time.
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Bocchiaro - 1

Aim: To replicate Milgram's findings of a wide gap between people's predictions of their own and others degree of obedience when contrasted with the actual behavioural outcomes in his experiment. 

Research Method: Laboratory study / Scenario study

Sample: 

  • 149 undergraduate students (96 women and 53 men)
  • Mean age of 20.8
  • Took part in exchange for either 7 Euros or course credit
  • 11 participants were removed from the initial sample of 160 because of their suspiciousness about the nature of the study.
  • 138 participants in the comparison group.
  • 92 participants in the 8 pilot studies
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Bocchiaro - 2

Procedure:

  • The study took place at the VU University in Amsterdam.
  • The comparison group was given a description of the experimental setting and then asked 'What would you do?' and 'What would the average student at your university do?'.
  • Each participant was greeted in the lab by a male Dutch experimenter who was formally dressed and had a stern demeanour. He requested each participant to provide a few names of fellow students, then presented the cover story.
  • They were told that the study was looking into the effects of sensory deprivation on brain function and that it had been conducted before with most participants saying that it was a frightening experience. 
  • Participants were then told that in the next room they could either write a letter to their friends recommending the study of to alert the Research committee of the study.
  • The experimenter then left the room for 3 minutes to allow participants to reflect on the decision they were about to make.
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Bocchiaro - 3

Procedure Continued: 

  • Participants were then moved to a second room where there was a computer for them to write their statement, a mailbox and research committee forms.
  • They were told to be enthusiastic when writing their statements and had to use two adjectives among 'Exciting', 'Incredible', 'Great', and 'Superb'. Negative effects of sensory deprivation were not to be mentioned.
  • The experimenter told the participants to begin and left the room for 7 minutes.
  • The experimenter then came back in and administered 2 personality inventories (HEXACO-PI-R and the Social Value Orientation), probed for suspicion, fully debriefed and asked them to sign a second consent form (This time fully informed).
  • The entire session lasted for approximately 40 minutes.
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Bocchiaro - Results and Conclusions

Results:

  • In the comparison group, only 3.6% indicated they would obey the experimenter. Most believed they would be either disobedient (31.9%) or a whistle-blower 64.5%).
  • Out of the 149 participants, 76.5% obeyed and 14.1% disobeyed whilst only 9.4% blew the whistle.
  • Results for individual differences in personality among the three groups showed no statistically significant differences in any of the six personality factors measured by the HEXACO-PI-R.

Conclusions:

  • People tend to obey authority figures, even if the authority is unjust. 
  • Individuals behave in completely different ways than expected when they find themselves in certain circumstaces that are unfamiliar and somewhat extreme.
  • With regard to faith, there appears to be a trend suggesting that whistleblowers have more faith than either obedient or disobedient individuals.
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