Stanley Milgram Case Study

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Assignment 2
Question 1 - Parenting styles
An authoritative parent is supportive and affectionate, but clearly defines reasonable limits and rules. They work with the child to help them succeed within the guidelines and will allow for flexibility. An authoritarian parent also sets rules, but the focus is on obedience rather than the child's success. They are strict with no flexibility and can be cold and unapproachable for the child. A permissive parent allows the child to set the agenda, setting few guidelines or direction for behavior. There is likely a strong, positive relationship, but the parent is more of a peer or friend than an authority figure. An uninvolved, or neglectful, parent provides little guidance or nurturing to the child. …show more content…

Stanley Milgram studied the impact of authority to determine if an authority figure could influence a person to violate their personal morals in order to comply with an authority. In the experiment, a fake subject was asked to answer a series of questions. The real subjects of the experiment were told to give electric shocks to the fake subjects when they answered wrong. The fake subjects never actually received shocks, but acted as if they had, expressing pain, fear, outrage, and even feigning serious injury. The experimenter required the real subjects to increase voltage, and 65% of the real subjects continued to shock the fake subjects to the point that they would have caused serious harm. The experiment showed that obedience to authority has a strong effect on a person's actions, in many cases even overriding an individual's sense of right and …show more content…

It might prevent someone from their day-to-day activities. It might also be a danger to the person or people around them. The behaviors of the person likely will fall outside of cultural expectations. For example, a person who washes their hands after using the bathroom is acceptable, but a person who washes their hands repeatedly many times per hour may be behaving outside of cultural norms. The person's behavior would be causing significant disruption in their ability to function; they could not have a job because of their need to act on the

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    Milgram’s experiment basically states, “Be that as it may, you’d still probably commit heinous acts under the pressure of authority.” He also, found that obedience was the highest when the person giving the orders was nearby and was perceived as an authority figure, especially if they were from a prestigious institution. This was also true if the victim was depersonalized or placed at a distance such as in another room. Subjects were more likely to comply with orders if they didn’t see anyone else disobeying if there were no role models of defiance.

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  • A Summary of "The Perils of Obedience"

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    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.

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  • Milgram's The Perils Of Obedience By Diana Baaumrind

    745 Words  | 2 Pages

    Obedience is when you do something you have been asked or ordered to do by someone in authority. As little kids we are taught to follow the rules of authority, weather it is a positive or negative effect. Stanley Milgram, the author of “The perils of Obedience” writes his experiment about how people follow the direction of an authority figure, and how it could be a threat. On the other hand Diana Baumrind article “Review of Stanley Milgram’s experiments on obedience,” is about how Milgram’s experiment was inhumane and how it is not valid. While both authors address how people obey an authority figure, Milgram focuses more on how his experiment was successful while Baumrind seems more concerned more with how Milgram’s experiment was flawed and

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  • An Experiment on Obedience in The Pearl´s of Obedience by Stanley Milgram

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    In this article “The Pearls of Obedience”, Stanley Milgram asserts that obedience to authority is a common response for many people in today’s society, often diminishing an individuals beliefs or ideals. Stanley Milgram designs an experiment to understand how strong a person’s tendency to obey authority is, even though it is amoral or destructive. Stanley Milgram bases his experiment on three people: a learner, teacher, and experimenter. The experimenter is simply an overseer of the experiment, and is concerned with the outcome of punishing the learner. The teacher, who is the subject of the experiment, is made to believe the electrical shocks are real; he is responsible for obeying the experimenter and punishing the learner for incorrect answers by electrocuting him from an electric shock panel that increases from 15 to 450 volts.

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  • Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience, by Diana Baumrind and Obedience, by Ian Parker

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    Upon analyzing his experiment, Stanley Milgram, a Yale psychologist, concludes that people will drive to great lengths to obey orders given by a higher authority. The experiment, which included ordinary people delivering “shocks” to an unknown subject, has raised many questions in the psychological world. Diana Baumrind, a psychologist at the University of California and one of Milgram’s colleagues, attacks Milgram’s ethics after he completes his experiment in her review. She deems Milgram as being unethical towards the subjects he uses for testing and claims that his experiment is irrelevant to obedience. In contrast, Ian Parker, a writer for New Yorker and Human Sciences, asserts Milgram’s experiments hold validity in the psychological world. While Baumrind focuses on Milgram’s ethics, Parker concentrates more on the reactions, both immediate and long-term, to his experiments.

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  • The Perils of Obedience, by Stanley Milgram

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    Stanley Milgram’s experiment shows societies that more people with abide by the rules of an authority figure under any circumstances rather than follow their own nature instinct. With the use of his well-organized article that appeals to the general public, direct quotes and real world example, Milgram’s idea is very well-supported. The results of the experiment were in Milgram’s favor and show that people are obedient to authority figures. Stanley Milgram shows the reader how big of an impact authority figures have but fails to answer the bigger question. Which is more important, obedience or morality?

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  • Parenting Styles In The Glass Castle

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    It is a mixture of very strict parenting and a laissez faire style. Authoritative parents are responsive, nurturing, and involved. But, authoritative parents don't let their kids get away with bad behavior. When kids make mistakes or misbehave, they attempt to reason with their children. Authoritative parents are also less likely to control their children through harsh or arbitrary punishments, shaming, or the withdrawal of love. Authoritative parents want to encourage independence in their kids. But they also want to foster self-discipline, maturity, and a respect for

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  • Comparing Views on Stanley Milgram's Experiment on Obedience

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    “Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments of Obedience” was written by Diane Baumrind. Baumrind is a psychologist at the Institute of Human Development at the University of California, Berkley. Throughout her article, Baumrind attacks multiple aspects of Milgram’s experiment. She immediately states that the location of the experiment played a factor in the produced results (Baumrind 225). She continues in saying the lack of emotion and concern from the teacher caused heavy stress on the subjects. Baumrind also calls into question the supposed attempts of Milgram to allow the subjects to leave in a clear, whole state of mind (Baumrind 227). The affects the experiment would have on the subjects afterwards is also a point of concern for Baumrind. Lastly, Baumrind pleads for the subjects to be fully informed of the experiment they would be partaking in (Baumrind 229). However, Baumrind is not the only author who reviews the experiment. Ian Parker, “Obedience”, writes about the consequences Milgram himself experienced after the results of hi...

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  • Compare And Contrast The Perils Of Obedience

    1257 Words  | 3 Pages

    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, in 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

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  • Stanley Milgram Set of Reading on Obedience

    955 Words  | 2 Pages

    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?

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  • The Milgram Experiment

    1574 Words  | 4 Pages

    (Hart) Stanley Milgram’s experiment in the way people respond to obedience is one of the most important experiments ever administered. The goal of Milgram’s experiment was to find the desire of the participants to shock a learner in a controlled situation. When the volunteer would be ordered to shock the wrong answers of the victims, Milgram was truly judging and studying how people respond to authority. Milgram discovered something both troubling and awe inspiring about the human race. “Since they were first published in 1963, MIlgram’s sensational findings have been offered as an explanation for mass genocide during the Holocaust and events such as the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam and the torture of prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison”(Perry 223-224). The way Milgram was able to control the experiment shows how the human race can crack under pressure and obey orders, no matter the consequence. Although, not everything was as it seems when it came to the results of the findings. As Milgram used actors to portray the “victims” in the experiment, so no one was truly being tortured. Milgram wanted to show that pressure can get to anyone, in any situation.

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  • Blindly Obeying Authority

    1789 Words  | 4 Pages

    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 experiences of real life. 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.

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  • Analysis Of The Perils Of Obedience Stanley Milgram

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    In 1961, Stanley Milgram, a Yale University Psychologist conducted a variety of social psychology experiments on obedience to authority figures. His experiments involved three individuals, one of them was a volunteer who played the role of the teacher, one was an actor who played the role of the student, and one was the experimenter who played the role of the authority. The teacher was instructed by the authority to administrate shocks to the student (who claimed to have a heart condition) whenever they answered a question incorrectly. The voltage of the shock would go up after every wrong answer. The experimenter would then instruct the teacher to administrate higher voltages even though pain was being imposed. The teacher would then have to make a choice between his morals and values or the choice of the authority figure. The point of the experiment was to try to comprehend just how far an individual would continue when being ordered by an individual in a trench coat to electrically shock another human being for getting questions incorrect. The experiment consisted of administrating pain to different people and proved that ordinary people will obey people with authority. Some of the various reasons are that the experimenter was wearing a trench coat, fear of the consequences for not cooperating, the experiments were conducted in Yale University a place of prestige, and the authority f...

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  • Permisive Parenting: Authoritarian And Permissive Parenting Style

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    Authoritarian parenting or strict parenting are formed by parents who are very demanding and lack of responsiveness. Parents do not allow long dialogue with their children, also they expect their children to follow very strict rules and if they do not follow those rules they will get punished by their parents demanding obedience. On the other hand, we have a different type of parenting style called permissive or indulgent, these types of parents are very responsive but they lack demanding, these parents are very nurturing, loving, and lenient. They avoid any type of confrontation with their child

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  • How To Evaluate Milgram's Experiments

    620 Words  | 2 Pages

    Stanley Milgram conducted this study to determine the extent to which humans will follow the orders given by someone who holds authority over them. The study was also used to determine if people would obey those in power even when what was being asked of them could be considered unethical. Milgram and psychology majors who were informed about the experiment in question predicted that most people would go against what was being asked of them, and that very few would reach the end of the allotted punishment (the electric shocks). Clearly, this research design was an experiment. The research took place in a controlled environment and had both a control group and an experimental group where the researchers were able to manipulate their independent

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