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Essay On Obedience And Authority

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The psychology of obedience and authority “Keep quiet. Do your job.” We come across commands like this in our daily lives all the time, whether its in a workplace, an educational institution or even at home by our own parents. That’s fine and all but what’s interesting is that we follow these commands, these orders sometimes willingly, sometimes grudgingly and at times even blindly. Why do we do that? Obedience, in human behaviour, according to simplepsychology.com is a form of "social influence in which a person yields to explicit instructions or orders from an authority figure". Obedience is distinguished from compliance, which is defined by behaviour influenced by peers and other external factors, and from conformity, which is behaviour intended to match that of the majority. Obedience, thus involves hierarchy of power/status. Time and again, when the topic of obedience and authority has risen in psychology arena, the example of Adolf Eichmann has also arisen. Adolf Eichmann was a popular figure of the Holocaust where he performed his job of planning of the efficient collection, transportation and extermination of millions Jewish people, gypsies, communists, trade unionists and homosexuals in concentration camps in Nazi Germany during World War II. At his trial in 1961, Eichmann expressed surprise at …show more content…

The actor would always claim to have drawn the slip that read "learner", which would guarantee that the subject would always be the "teacher". The "teacher" and "learner" were separated and housed in different rooms where they could communicate but couldn’t see each

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