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What was the outcome of milgram's study of obedience
Obedience to authority stanley milgram chapter summaries
What was the outcome of milgram's study of obedience
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Obedience is defined as a type of social influence whereby somebody acts in response to a direct order from another person (Clemson, 2001 p. 105). Obedience is a necessary behaviour that is required in society so that order and progress can be made. Obedience is useful throughout society in business, politics and everyday life, however, if the authority that is directing orders is not questioned, obedience can be blind and destructive, resulting in catastrophic incidents. Stanley Milgram famously conducted controversial but groundbreaking research into human obedience to authority. This essay will first of all describe the background, the procedure and the results from the study and then go on to evaluate the validity and discuss the impact it has had on our understanding of obedience. Milgram carried out his study of obedience to authority (1962 - 1963) with the intention to find to what extent people will obey authority. When trialled, veteran Nazis of World War Two claimed they were ‘only following orders’, and it was this that inspired Milgram to carry out his research (Cardwell, 1996 p. 53). “How is it possible… that ordinary people who are courteous and decent in every day life can act callously and inhumanly without any limitations of conscience?” asks Milgram (cheyennemangum, 2011). Milgram wanted to put to test the …show more content…
People’s tendency to obey authority has been shown to override any moral principles although the study has also shown that the people who are obeying orders that are immoral do suffer severe internal conflict when acting out these orders. This raises the question whether destructive obedience to authority is learned, instinctive, or both. Obedience therefore is a behavior of humans that can be positively constructive or, if not questioned by the individual, blindly
In "The Perils of Obedience," Stanley Milgram conducted a study that tests the conflict between obedience to authority and one's own conscience. Through the experiments, Milgram discovered that the majority of people would go against their own decisions of right and wrong to appease the requests of an authority figure.
In the research article “OBEY AT ANY COST”, Stanley Milgram conducted a study to examine the concept of obedience and composed disturbing findings. Milgram’s findings on obedience were considered one of the most influential and famous works in the history of psychology. His examination on obedience was that people were possibly capable of doing abuse to other individuals by being demanded to do so. Milgram pertained this to World War II and the inhumanity that has been bolstered and the barbarity. Yet, his hypothesis was that people have the propensity to obey is authoritative which cancels out a person’s capability to act morally, sympathetically, or even ethically. However, Milgram’s theoretical basis for this particular study was that human
If a person of authority ordered you inflict a 15 to 400 volt electrical shock on another innocent human being, would you follow your direct orders? That is the question that Stanley Milgram, a psychologist at Yale University tested in the 1960’s. Most people would answer “no,” to imposing pain on innocent human beings but Milgram wanted to go further with his study. Writing and Reading across the Curriculum holds a shortened edition of Stanley Milgram’s “The Perils of Obedience,” where he displays an eye-opening experiment that tests the true obedience of people under authority figures. He observes that most people go against their natural instinct to never harm innocent humans and obey the extreme and dangerous instructions of authority figures. Milgram is well aware of his audience and organization throughout his article, uses quotes directly from his experiment and connects his research with a real world example to make his article as effective as possible.
“The Perils of Obedience” was written by Stanley Milgram in 1974. In the essay he describes his experiments on obedience to authority. I feel as though this is a great psychology essay and will be used in psychology 101 classes for generations to come. The essay describes how people are willing to do almost anything that they are told no matter how immoral the action is or how much pain it may cause.
In a series of experiments conducted from 1960 to 1963, American psychologist Stanley Milgram, sought to examine the relationship between obedience and authority in order to understand how Nazi doctors were able to carry out experiments on prisoners during WWII. While there are several theories about Milgram’s results, philosopher Ruwen Ogien uses the experiment as grounds for criticizing virtue ethics as a moral theory. In chapter 9 of Human Kindness and The Smell of Warm Croissant, Ogien claims that “what determines behavior is not character but other factors tied to situation” (Ogien 120). The purpose of this essay is not to interpret the results of the Milgram experiments. Instead this essay serves to argue why I am not persuaded by Ogien’s
Comparative Analysis Obedience to authority and willingness to obey an authority against one’s morals has been a topic of debate for decades. Stanley Milgrim, a Yale psychologist, conducted a study in which his subjects were commanded by a person in authority to initiate lethal shocks to a learner; his experiment is discussed in detail in the article “The Perils of Obedience” (Milgrim 77). Milgrim’s studies are said to be the most “influential and controversial studies of modern psychology” (Levine). While the leaner did not actually receive fatal shocks, an actor pretended to be in extreme pain, and 60 percent of the subjects were fully obedient, despite evidence displaying they believed what they were doing was harming another human being (Milgrim 80). Likewise, Dr. Zimbardo, a professor of psychology at Stanford University, conducted an experiment, explained in his article “The Stanford Prison Experiment,” in which ten guards were required to keep the prisoners from escape and under control.
Compliance is “a form of social influence involving direct requests from one person to another”, whilst Obedience is “a form of social influence in which one person simply orders one or more others to perform some actions” (Baron, R.A. & Branscombe, N.R., 2014, p. 255). These two terms are methods of social influence, particularly prominent in Milgram’s study on obedience. Milgram’s study is a psychological experiment focusing on whether or not people would obey authority figures, even when the instructions given were morally wrong. Back then; the terms of the experiment were completely acceptable, but due to the strict controls of contemporary psychology today, this test would be impossible to repeat. The trial breaches many ethical factors
Obedience is the requirement of all mutual living and is the basic element of the structure of social life. Conservative philosophers argue that society is threatened by disobedience, while humanists stress the priority of the individuals' conscience. Stanley Milgram, a Yale psychologist, designed an experiment that forced participants to either violate their conscience by obeying the immoral demands of an authority figure or to refuse those demands. Milgram's study, reported in "The Perils of Obedience" suggested that under a special set of circumstances the obedience we naturally show authority figures can transform us into agents of terror or monsters towards humanity.
Why so many people obey when they feel coerced? Social psychologist Stanley Milgram made an experiment to find the effect of authority on obedience. He concluded that people obey either out of fear or out of a desire to cooperate with the authority, even when acting against their own better judgment and desires. Milgram’s experiment illustrates that people's reluctance to confront those who abuse power. The point of the experiment was to see how far a person will proceed in a concrete and measurable situation in which he is ordered to inflict increasing pain on a protesting victim, at what point will the subject refuse to obey the experimenter. One main question of the experiment was that how far the participant will comply with the experimenter’s instructions before refusing to carry out the actions required of him?
Through my research and findings of obedience to authority this ancient dilemma is somewhat confusing but needs understanding. Problem with obedience to authority has raised a question to why people obey or disobey and if there are any right time to obey or not to obey. Through observation of many standpoints on obedience and disobedience to authority, and determined through detailed examination conducted by Milgram “The Perils Of Obedience,” Doris Lessing “Group Minds” and Shirley Jackson “The Lottery”. We have to examine this information in hopes of understanding or at least be able to draw our own theories that can be supported and proven on this subject.
Stanley Milgram’s (1963), Behavioral Study of Obedience measured how far an ordinary subject will go beyond their fundamental moral character to comply with direction from authority to punish another person, and at what point would they refuse to obey and end their participation.
More specifically, the movie A Few Good Men depicts the results of blindly obeying orders. Stanley Milgram, a Yale psychologist, also explores obedience to authority in his essay “ The Perils of Obedience”. On the other hand, Erich Fromm, a psychoanalyst and philosopher, focused on disobedience to authority in his essay “ Disobedience as a Psychological and Moral Problem.” Milgram wrote about how people were shockingly obedient to authority when they thought they were harming someone else while Fromm dissected both: why people are so prone to obey and how disobedience from authoritative figures can bring beneficial changes for society. Obeying commands, even when they go against our morals, is human nature; Disobeying commands, however, is challenging to do no matter what the situation is.
It is human nature to respect and obey elders or authoritative figures, even when it may result in harm to oneself or others. Stanley Milgram, an American social psychologist, conducted an experiment to test the reasoning behind a person’s obedience. He uses this experiment in hope to gain a better understanding behind the reason Hitler was so successful in manipulating the Germans along with why their obedience continued on such extreme levels. Milgram conducts a strategy similar to Hitler’s in attempt to test ones obedience. Diana Baumrind, a clinical and developmental psychologist, disagreed with Milgram’s experiment in her article, ”Some Thoughts on Ethics of Research: After Reading Milgram’s “Behavioral Study of obedience”, Baumrind explains
Introduction Individuals often yield to conformity when they are forced to discard their individual freedom in order to benefit the larger group. Despite the fact that it is important to obey the authority, obeying the authority can sometimes be hazardous, especially when morals and autonomous thought are suppressed to an extent that the other person is harmed. Obedience usually involves doing what a rule or a person tells you to, but negative consequences can result from displaying obedience to authority; for example, the people who obeyed the orders of Adolph Hitler ended up killing innocent people during the Holocaust. In the same way, Stanley Milgram noted in his article ‘Perils of Obedience’ of how individuals obeyed authority and neglected their conscience, reflecting how this can be destructive in real life experiences. On the contrary, Diana Baumrind pointed out in her article ‘Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience’ that the experiments were not valid, hence useless.
Obedience is a widely debated topic today with many different standpoints from various brilliant psychologists. Studying obedience is still important today to attempt to understand why atrocities like the Holocaust or the My Lai Massacre happened so society can learn from them and not repeat history. There are many factors that contribute to obedience including situation and authority. The film A Few Good Men, through a military court case, shows how anyone can fall under the influence of authority and become completely obedient to conform to the roles that they have been assigned. A Few Good Men demonstrates how authority figures can control others and influence them into persuading them to perform a task considered immoral or unethical.