Obedience To Authority Experiment By Stanley Milgram

David’s claim that the Holocaust occurred because the Germans became unusually cruel is false based on the fundamental attribution error and Milgram’s experiments. The fundamental attribution error is the tendency to attribute other people’s behavior to internal factors, instead of accounting for situational factors. David committed this error when stating that Germans, as a whole, were “sadistic people with abnormal and twisted personalities”. David did not account for the immense pressure that the German public felt from Hitler during World War II. Although many atrocities were being committed, the Germans feared for their lives if they stood up for the Jews and disobeyed Hitler’s rule. David would be correct if he said that some Germans became systematically cruel, but the fundamental attribution error is introduced when David says that all Germans became systematically cruel.

Throughout experiment 12-13, Milgram wondered if the person who gives the orders would change; would the amount of obedience increase? His results indicated that yes, the amount of obedience increased. In experiment 12, the learner demands to continue with the experiment. However, the experimenter told the subject to stop at 150 volts. 100% of the subjects obeyed the experimenter while discarding the learners plead to continue. In experiment 13, the same situation occurred except for the fact that the experimenter as now a “common man”. The results of obedience lowered greatly. 16 of the 20 subject refused to continue. This proved that the subject is obedient, to a person with authentic authority and not a “common man”.

At the time, the Milgram experiment ethics seemed reasonable, but by modern day psychology, this experiment would have never been allowed today. Milgram’s generation needed conclusive answers about the “final solution”. Standard ethics in modern day psychology state that participants in any experiment must not be deceived, and that they must be made aware of any consequences. In fairness, research performed after the experiment, indicated that there were no long term psychological effects on the participants. However, the fact that these “teachers” thought that they had caused suffering to another human being, could have caused severe emotional

At Yale University, Stanley Milgram a psychologist carried out the most famous study of obedience in psychology. The experiment was focused on the conflict between obedience to authority and personal ethics. In 1963, Milgram was interested in researching how far a person would go in obeying an instruction if it involved harming another person. Milgram was interested to see how an individual could be influenced by committing murders, for instance the Germans in World War II. Milgram wanted to investigate whether Germans were obedient to their superiors as that was the common explanation for assassinations in the Nazi in World War II. At Yale University, Milgram selected participants by placing an announcement that was printed in the newspaper highlighting the male participants to take part in the study of learning.

Ethically, a significant critique of the experiment is that the participants actually believed they were administering serious harm to a real person, completely unaware that the learner was in fact acting. Although Milgram argued that the illusion was a necessary part of the experiment to study the participants’ reaction, they were exposed to a highly stressful situation. Many were visibly distraught throughout the duration of the test

In the Abu Ghraib Torture and the Milgram experiment even though they had different reasoning behind it, the same concept is behind it. The obedience to authority people tend to have is either to obey or disobey authority and do what they think is right. In both this situation many people decided to obey authority and break their morals. Why would anyone hurt someone else and put them through suffering? What would make the people lose their morals/values? Giving the chance to torture someone or have authority in your power many people will take that chance and forget about their morals/values and knowing that other people are giving them permission to do anything they want and the higher person in charge will take

Usually, people follow given orders from authority. Authority can be a work boss, parents, teachers, etc. We are taught to follow orders at a young age so we won’t have issues with obedience in the future. The Milgram Experiment was basically testing how far someone could commit to their obedience before it became too much.

Since the beginning of the human existence, man has always dominated and ruled over one another be it empires, corporations, or small groups. Authority and obedience has always been a factor of who we are. This natural occurrence can be seen clearly through the psychological experiments known as The Milgram Experiment and the Stanford Prison Experiment. Both of these studies are based on how human beings react to authority figures and what their obedience is when faced with conflict.

“The Perils of Obedience”, written by Stanley Milgram in 1973, explores how her experiment demonstrated people’s affinity to obey orders even if it means someone will get hurt. Milgram is a leading social psychologist who disproved previously considered notions about obedience and authority. Her work demonstrates how obedience trumps morality and gives support for this phenomena with examples from history. By using different participants’ reactions, the author is able to analyze the meaning behind the experiment.

I was assigned to watch two films outside of class in criminology for this assignment. I have not ever been assigned to watch a film for any of my classes outside of class. So I thought to myself, this is going to be one of my least favorite assignments I have ever done. Little did I know, that this assignment would turn into one of my favorite assignments I have ever been asked to do. The first film was a film called “Zimbardo Speaks: The Lucifer Effect and the Psychology of Evil”. The second film we were assigned to watch was a film called “The Stanford Prison Experiment”. Both of these films stated very interesting and reliable points throughout the duration of the film. The points that these films were making really made a significant impact

His experiment was used to demonstrate how people respond to orders from people with authority no matter what the order was. He started by having participants test another “participant”, who actually was one of Milgram’s men who knew what was going on. Each time the fake participant chose the wrong answer, the real participant had to shock them with a higher voltage until they got to one that would be deadly. Milgram changed parts of the experiment to find variables that changed how far the real participant would go. He noticed that location and experimenter’s dress apparel changes how likely it is that the real participant would go to the deadly voltage. He saw that the more personal, or close, the real participant had to be to the fake one, while they were being shocked, affected the obedience as well. He also noticed that if there were two other fake participants teaching that refused to shock their learners that the real participant would not comply. Finally, he tested the experimenter telling the real patient to shock the learner by telephone, instead of actually being there in person, reduced obedience as well (McLead).

Speaking of one of the most renowned psychological experiment, which even replications on TV are done, is the Milgram experiment, on obedience to authority figures. It involves the measurement of how much participants will to obey the authority, in order to explain the reason why soldiers obeyed to allow the Holocaust, the homicides of millions of Jews, happened. With the participants’ roles as a teacher to punish a learner by incrementing degrees of electric shocks, though they didn’t know it’s staged, 65% of them did it to the last under the horrendous moans and the commands of the experimenters, which surpassed the expectation of 1.2%. Milgram himself elaborated two theories, encompassing theory of

The Stanley Milgram Experiment is a famous study about obedience in psychology which has been carried out by a Psychologist at the Yale University named, Stanley Milgram. He conducted an experiment focusing on the conflict between obedience to authority and personal conscience. In July 1961 the experiment was started for researching that how long a person can harm another person by obeying an instructor.

It showed how normal civilians acted when they were given authority over others. Even the most cordial, intelligent people can take on an evil, machiavellianistic nature when introduced to a dominant role in an individualized setting. This experiment taught psychologists so many things about human behavior and the prison system. It is an event that is taught in classrooms all over the world. While some people question the ethics of the experiment, it paved the way for more understanding as well as the reform of psychological practices

We have been trained to be obedient to authority. This quality is deep-rooted in us all from the manner in which we were brought up. It is natural for people to obey orders from those whom they recognized as their authority. This is the natural response to legitimate authority and can be learnt in a variety of situations.