Obedience in Milgram’s Experiment Essay

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Stanley Milgram managed to conduct the experiment that revealed the distinct features of the members of our society. He questioned how millions of ordinary people in Germany could obey the immoral commands of the Nazi government and provided the study exploring the mechanisms of human obedience to authorities. Though Milgram’s experiment has provoked a huge amount of criticism, the analysis of internal and external validity, ethical issues, and the contribution of the experiment to modern science reveals the significance of the findings of the study.

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Main Objectives and Findings of the Study

The experiment was designed to find out to which extent ordinary people are ready to hurt other innocent members of the society if causing pain is a part of their duties at work or elsewhere. Therefore, the main object of the study can be defined as people’s obedience to the instructions given by people occupying superior positions in situations putting a threat to the well-being of an innocent person. The results of the study show that most people obey the instructions even if they are related to hurting people. The main lesson depicted by the author based on the results of the study shows that “ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process” (Milgram 367).

Evaluating the Framework of the Experiment

Milgram created the conditions that helped to reveal the motifs and specifics of the behavior of the participants of the experiment in the most effective way. After using Yale undergraduates as the subjects of the study, the author was condemned for lack of objectivity in the experiment, as this category of people shared similar features, including high competitiveness and aggressiveness aimed at achieving success. Therefore, Milgram changed the strategy and selected the participants who were representatives of different social groups, including “professionals, white-collar workers, unemployed persons, and industrial workers” (Milgram 362). It let the researcher make conclusions that reflect the disposition peculiar to all members of the society. Besides, Milgram conducted the same experiment in different regions (Princeton, Munich, Rome, South Africa, and Australia), where the participants included people of different nations and religions. Such strategy makes the results of the experiment relevant to any country.

Baumrind claimed that as the experiment was held in the laboratory, the atmosphere of the place created certain pressure on the subjects because of the unfamiliarity with the setting (372). The psychologist emphasized that “the anxiety and passivity generated by the setting” contributed to the participants’ inclination to “behave in an obedient suggestible way” (Baumrind 372). However, such critique can be regarded as not well-grounded enough, as most experiments require using laboratory setting. Such setting does not create a critical level of anxiety in most cases.

Evaluating the Scenario of the Experiment

The scenario used by Milgram presents an example of scientific genius able to construct the appropriate conditions for revealing the nature of the investigated phenomena. Milgram’s talent has managed to create the experimental procedure that illustrates those sides of human personality that are difficult to be properly analyzed in common everyday situations. The scenario was developed to investigate the obedience by simulating situation making the person choose between sticking to moral values, such as kindness and unwillingness to hurt an innocent person, and sticking to instructions given by an authoritative person. In my opinion, such scenario perfectly reflects real life situations when people need to obey the commands given by those who occupy superior positions even if they contradict morality. The procedure helped to determine the mechanisms involved in the process of following the instructions, which obviously can cause harm to a person and explain why millions of people were ready to obey the cruel dictator in Nazi Germany.

Baumrind suggests that the scenario of the experiment cannot be considered able to illustrate the causes of the behavior of people in Hitler’s Germany because in the second case “the victims were perceived as subhuman” due to the dominating ideology (375). However, the prevalence of ideology determining other nations as subhuman is also a direct consequence of obedience to norms and regulation employed by authoritative sources. Besides, the disposition to regard certain category of people as a lower class is reflected in the experiment as the position of teacher occupied by the participants during the experiment creates a certain sense of attaining the power over the learner. Milgram emphasizes that though the subjects of the experiment did not receive satisfaction from delivering shock and causing pain to the learner, they liked the feeling they got “from pleasing the experimenter” (367). They were proud of doing their jobs and “obeying the experimenter under difficult circumstances” (Milgram 367). The same scheme applies to the behavior of ordinary people who were delivering the instructions of Hitler’s government in Germany.

Evaluating the Methodological Issues

Methodological basis of Milgram’s experiment can raise many questions. The experimental realism should be properly assessed, as it needs to be clear whether the participants truly believed that they were harming the learner. If the participants had some suspicions about the realism of the event and were just pretending to be distressed, then the interpretation of the results as demonstrating destructive disobedience can be found invalid. The signs of distress described by the scientist in his study prove the realism of the experienced feelings. Milgram’s description of the behavior of Fred Prozi can be a proof of the experimental realism: “After delivering 180-volt shock, he pivots around in his chair and, shaking his head, addresses the experimenter in agitated tone” (Milgram 362). Mr. Braverman also demonstrated the signs of significant distress (Milgram 365). Therefore, the participants did believe that the situation was real, as they demonstrated the behavior typical of psychological distress.

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Another aspect of internal validity related to the methodology of the experiment is the impact of compounding variables. Milgram’s experiment was adequately controlled, and, therefore, the compounding variables were reduced and did not influence the validity. As one demand characteristic of any experiment is the duty of participants to obey the instructions that are given by the experimenter, the participants’ obedience during the experiment could be explained by common behavioral pattern applied in the corresponding situations rather than by their personal inclination to be obedient. However, the framework of the experiment requires the same level of obedience, as the work conditions or any other situation involving receiving behavior instructions from official institutions do. Therefore, demand characteristics do not appear to cause serious impact on the validity of the experiment.

External Validity of the Experiment

The main drawback of Milgram’s experiment, which reduces its external validity, can be defined as its set-up in a laboratory situation. Such framework could be the cause of the impossibility of generalizing the results and findings to the real world. However, the experiment can be regarded as very close to real-life social situations. Besides, any research set-up that is organized so that it resembles real situations can be considered mundane as the participants regard it as real. The behavioral patterns investigated in the study apply to any situation involving necessity to obey instructions given by the figure occupying the superior authoritative position.

Another way to measure the external validity of the study is to find appropriate studies that replicated the same results. Milgram conducted several replications of his experiment and received very similar results. He mentions similar experiments conducted in other countries and involving participants from different social groups and emphasizes the similarity of the gained results (Milgram 362).

Ethical Issues

Milgram’s experiment is famous for raising many ethical issues. Baumrind claims that the “emotional disturbance” experienced by the participants could cause “an alteration subject’s self-image or ability to trust adult authorities in the future” (374). She criticized Milgram for the psychological harm he caused to the participants. She claimed that Milgram intended to put pressure on the participants and that such pressure contributed to stress and emotional upset. She emphasized the bad impact of the experiment on the participants as it involved “loss of dignity, self-esteem and trust in rational authority” (Baumrind 376). However, Milgram stated that the participants were informed about the details and the purpose of the experiment and given the chance to discuss all their concerns after it was finished. In his study, he mentions informing the participants about “the actual nature and the true purpose of experiment” (Milgram 365).

Besides, he mentions the use of questionnaire a year after the experiment (Milgram 365). Such examination conducted after the experiment by using questionnaire showed that most participants were glad they took part in the study. It can be demonstrated on the example of Mr. Braverman, who affirmed in the questionnaire that he had learned “something of personal importance” (Milgram 365). He also admitted that he hoped that such experience would help him to deal with “conflicts of values” more effectively in the future (Milgram 366). Therefore, concerns about the ethical side of the experiment appear to be not grounded on real difficulties experienced by the participants. On the contrary, the participants appeared to be satisfied with the participation in the experiment and regarded it as a useful lesson.

The Contribution of the Experiment

Milgram’s experiment has made a huge contribution to social psychology. It helped to understand the algorithms of human behavior while being oppressed by an authority. The study has shown that common adult people are ready to obey the commands of the authority even if they contradict their morality. This fact explains how government can manage to make ordinary people obey the regulations that seem to be unethical and unacceptable. Milgram’s experiment revealed that humans are heavily influenced by authorities and are disposed to be manipulated by them, which can cause destructive obedience.

Milgram’s experiment has become one of the most famous social-psychological investigations in psychology in the twentieth century. The analysis of different aspects of Milgram’s study helps to understand its significance and an important place it occupies in modern science. By evaluating the relevance of the study and the objectivity of critique provided by Baumrind, I have concluded that the results of Milgram’s experiment can be regarded as objective and reliable proof of human inclination to destructive obedience. I fully agree with the results of the experiment and regard it as an unprecedented study on obedience.

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Works Cited

Baumrind, Diana. “Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience.” Writing and Reading across the Curriculum. 10th ed. 2007. Ed. Laurence Behrens and Leonard Rosen. London: Longman. 371-377. Print.

Milgram, Stanley. “The Perils of Obedience.” Writing and Reading across the Curriculum. 10th ed. 2007. Ed. Laurence Behrens and Leonard Rosen. London: Longman. 358-370. Print.

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