Key Study : Milgram - Situational Variables Affecting Obedience

Key Study : Milgram

Procedure

40 participants at a time over a series of conditions, each varying some aspect of the situation to calculate its effect on obedience. Participants were told it was the study of how punishment effects learning. Two experimental Confederates: an experimenter, and a 47-year-old man who was introduced as another volunteer participant. The two participants drew lots to see who would be 'teacher' and 'student'. This was rigged so that the real participant was always the teacher and the 'fake' participant the learner.

The teacher was required to test the learner on his ability to remember word pairs. Every time they got one wrong the teacher had to administer increasingly strong electric shocks, starting a 15 volts, and then continuing…