The Milgram experiment is probably one of the most well known experiments in Psychology. The reason being is because its participants were not told what was really occurring in the experiment. After the experiment was over, the participants were mentally and emotionally affected. Later, a cognitive psychologist, George Miller described Milgram’s experiments, together with Zimbardo’s Prison Experiment, as “being ideal for public consumption of psychological research” (Blass, 2002). And indeed, Milgram’s studies, as Zimbardo’s, are clearly meant to be spread to a broad audience, the moral and preventative objectives permeating the experiments from their very outset (Stavrakis, 2007).. In this paper, I will explore how experiments such as Milgram and Zimbardo’s, as well as the Tuskeegee Syphilis Experiment, changed the way experiments are conducted today because of the formation of the Institutional Review Board (IRB). The Milgram experiment began in 1961, shortly after World War II. After the war is when the infamous Nuremburg Trials took place. The actions of the Natzis really stood out to Stanley Milgram, a Yale University psychologist. He wanted to study the willingness to obey instructions from an authority figure to perform acts that conflicted with one’s personal conscience, such as those that occurred during the Holocaust. He came up with an experimental set-up where he could test the levels of obedience when people were ordered to punish another person by subjecting him to increasing levels of painful electric shocks – this person was actually receiving no shocks at all (Diski, 2004). The basis of the experiment included the participant, a second person, who was actually a confederate, and an experimenter in a grey la... ... middle of paper ... ...anford prison experiment. American Psychologist, 53(7): 709- 727. Milgram, S. (1963). Behavioral study of obedience. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. 67: 371–378. Milgram, S. (1965a). Some conditions of obedience and disobedience to authority. Human Relations, 18(1): 57-70. Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to authority: An experimental view. London: Tavistock Orne, M. T., & Holland, C. H. (1968). On the ecological validity of laboratory deceptions. International Journal of Psychiatry, 6: 282-293. Parker, I. (2005). Lacanian discourse analysis in psychology: Seven theoretical elements. Theory & Psychology, 15: 163–82. Rothman, D.J. (1987). Ethics and human experimentation. New England Journal of Medicine, 317: 1195- 9. Stavrakakis, Y. (2007). The lacanian left. Psychoanalysis, theory, politics. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
In “ Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments On Obedience” by Diana Baumrind, and in “Obedience” by Ian Parker, the writers claim that Milgram’s Obedience is ethically wrong and work of evil because of the potential harm that the subjects of the experiment had. While Baumrind’s article focused only on the Subjects of the experiment, Parker’s article talked about both immediate and long term response to experiment along with the reaction of both the general public and Milgram’s colleagues, he also talks about the effect of the experiment on Milgram himself. Both articles discuss has similar points, they also uses Milgram’s words against him and while Baumrind attacks Milgram, Parker shows the reader that experiment
The Stanley Milgram “Obedience” Study was an experiment conducted at Yale University in 1962 by Milgram, who’s goal was to test the power of obedience to authority. Milgram was in search to understand how the Nazis, who were normal German citizens, could willingly inflict pain onto innocent people. In order to find the answer to this, Milgram decided to perform a research that measured the willingness of an ordinary individual to commit cruel acts on a civilian. The experiment had an intricate set up which involved three participants that all had a different role. There was the “teacher”, “learner”, and “authoritative figure” who was dressed in a lab coat and posed as a scientist. The learner and authoritative figure were actors who were
Milgram’s experiment started shortly after the trial of Adolf Eichmann began. Adolf Eichmann was a Nazi who tortured many Jews during the Holocaust, and had others under his hand do whatever he told them to do. Milgram decided to plan a study to merely see if the followers of E...
In Lauren Slater’s book Opening Skinner’s Box, the second chapter “Obscura” discusses Stanley Milgram, one of the most influential social psychologists. Milgram created an experiment which would show just how far one would go when obeying instructions from an authoritative figure, even if it meant harming another person while doing so. The purpose of this experiment was to find justifications for what the Nazi’s did during the Holocaust. However, the experiment showed much more than the sociological reasoning behind the acts of genocide. It showed just how much we humans are capable of.
Three big ideas in Obedience to Authority are personal conscience, the power of obedience, and the influence of authority. With the authority figure pressuring the participants to keep going with the shocks, the participants felt they had to obey. Milgram found, “Many subjects will obey the experimenter no matter how vehement the pleading of the person being shocked, no matter how painful the shocks seem to be, and no matter how much the victim pleads to be let out.” (Pg. 4-5). The syllables are.
Starting in 1961, Stanley Milgram, a professor of psychology at Yale University began conducting one of the most “infamous” psychology experiments in history. The tests are “infamous” because of not only the results they revealed, but also because the manner in which the tests were performed is considered unethical by today’s standards of testing. The experiment, which was mentioned in the New Haven Register newspaper as a “scientific study of memory and learning,” was actually an effort to investigate obedience to authority. In order to attract participants Milgram offered $4 for one hour of a person’s time. In the ensuing two years, hundreds of people would be a part of the experiment at Milgram’s
Haslam, Nick, Steve Loughnan, and Gina Perry. "Meta-Milgram: An Empirical Synthesis of the Obedience Experiments." PLoS ONE 9.4 (2014): 1-9. Print.
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
In today’s society, obedience to authority is a common factor that is taught at a young age, in which there is a constant lesson to obey the elders and teachers. Disobedience and obedience in lodged deeply within everyone and without recognition, is an automatic response, however there are numerous times where society conforms to a new political standpoint which can turn out to be genocidal effect. Therefore Stanley Milgram, a Yale psychologist, conducted the Milgram Experiment in which he puts volunteered test subjects in an environment where they have the opportunity to obey or disobey authority while causing unnecessary pain to an individual, exemplified in his article, “The Perils of Obedience”. Within his essay, the author reveals that the percentage of people who were willing to
...g factors such as fear of consequences for not obeying, human nature’s willingness to conform, perceived stature of authority and geographical locations. I also believe that due to most individual’s upbringings they will trust and obey anyone in an authoritative position even at the expense of their own moral judgment. I strongly believe that Stanley Milgram’s experiments were a turning point for the field of social psychology and they remind us that “ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process”. Despite these findings it is important to point out it is human nature to be empathetic, kind and good to our fellow human beings. The shock experiments reveal not blind obedience but rather contradictory ethical inclinations that lie deep inside human beings.
The general goal of the experiment was to see how much pain an ordinary citizen would inflict another person just because he or she was ordered to do so by an experimental scientist. In his article, "The Perils of Obedeince", Milgram concluded his analysis of the experiment by saying "Ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority," (Milgram, 1974, p76). Milgram summarized that obedience is a basic behavior element in social life that is deeply ingrained that it override people from acting according to the ethics, sympathy, and moral conduct (Milgram, 1973, p62). The way obedience is set in the modern society leads to the loss of personal responsibility from ordinary citizens. In the society, people are taught to behave legally and morally. However, Milgram argued that learning ethics does not necessarily determine what people will actually do in their real-life situations (Milgram, 1973, p76). To check the experiment 's accuracy, similar experiments were held in different countries such as South Africa,
Factors such as institutional authority, people’s attitude change after the experiment, participants’ interaction with the experimenters or the confederates may play an important role in the results of Milgram’s experiment. People or even social psychologists can also be vulnerable to the situational factors and thus conform or obey.
Obedience has many forms and there are multiple reasons as to why people are obedient, whether yielding to authority or as an effort to please someone. Every reason can lead to different outcomes, having negative and positive results. Obedience can oftentimes be a response to a situation as well. Both Stanley Milgram, author of “The Perils of Obedience,” and Ian Parker, author of “Obedience,” talk about the reasoning behind obedience and the variables that enable such responses but, in the end, they come to different conclusions.
In 1963 Stanley Milgram, a Yale psychologist, created an experiment examining obedience. This experiment has been questioned by many psychology professionals. One psychologist Diana Baumrind transcribes her feelings in the “Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience.” Baumrind, when writing the review, was employed at the Institute of Human Development, University of California, Berkeley. In her review Baumrind denounces Milgram for his treatment of his subjects, potentially harming their self image. However, Ian Parker, a British journalist who has written for the New Yorker and Human Sciences, believes Milgram’s findings still hold a significant place in society today. In his article “Obedience” Parker focuses on the purpose of the experiments, differing from Baumrind’s emphasis on the unethical theories of the experiment. Baumrind believes the setting was a factor playing against the results of the experiment, Baumrind and Parker both make references to the unethical beliefs of the experiment; they also dissolve the reference to Milgram’s comparison to the Nazi Party during the Holocaust.
Milgram, S. (1963). Behavioral study of obedience. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 67, 371-378.