1. Unit 3: Obedience and Conformity
Part 1: Obedience

2. Todays outcomes Last lesson This week Next lesson Introduced Obedience
Genocide
Case studies –A, B, C
Must: Define obedience
Should describe and discuss Milgram's Study on Obedience
Could: Evaluate the usefulness of this study using real life examples
Evaluate Obedience
Introduce the assessment

3. Obedience
‘A form of social influence in which a person yields to explicit instructions and orders from an authority figure’ (Oxford dictionary of Psychology, 2006).
Remember: The person can still hold the opinion that what they are following is not right! For example:

4. Recap Who are we obedient to? What do they have in common?
Examples from last lesson:
MacDonalds:
Hofling Nurses obedience experiment:
Beware! made by students!!

5. Part 1 : Obedience Essay
Learning outcomes
Assessment Criteria
3. Understand the reasons why people obey authority
3.1 Evaluate Milgram's Studies of obedience
3.2 Discuss the ethical issues raised by this research
3.3 Assess whether the knowledge gained about human behaviour justifies Milgram’s experiments
When you evaluate something, you're making a judgment, one that most likely results from some degree of analysis (Vocabulary, 2015)

6. Milgram Video: 40 Minutes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bY3SC2Rq_V8
Questions:

7. Outcomes Last lesson This lesson Next lesson
Watched the video on Milgram’s experiment
Must:
Highlight the facts about the experiment
Should:
analyse differing rates of obedience seen in Milgram’s experiments
Could:
evaluate the ethical concerns of the experiments and whether the study relates to real life examples
Finish off obedience
Relating to real life- NOTE
In-depth look at genocide
Mini workshop

8. Question 1
To understand how ordinary people can obey an authority figure’s order to commit crimes
Massacre at Babi Yar: 1941
Cambodia :

9. Question 2: What factors aided Obedience in the study?
Authority (Researcher)
Legitimisation
Reasoning: valid reason
Appearance- uniform
Proximity : the Teacher was in another room

10. Supporting evidence: The power of the uniform
Bickman 1974 :
Pick up paper
Or give a coin to
motorists so they can park
80% obedience
Even more then the
experimenter Uniform!
Example
Why is the uniform so powerful?

11. Question 3 Results of the study were:
65% of participants (out of 14) administered the top amount of electric shocks
All participants went up to 300volts shock
Conclusion: ‘Ordinary people are capable of following orders, even if these could result in killing another’ (Milgram 1963) …..
There is a fundamental human disposition to obey. This interacts with environment ..
Although Milgram did not believe in an ‘obedient personality factor’.

12. Variations of study graph

13. Other variations of the study
1. Proximity to the ‘victim’
Learner and teacher (participant) were in same room- obedience dropped to 40%
When teacher( participant) had to force hand down on shock plate= 30% obedience

14. 2. Proximity to authority figure
When experimenter left room : participant would lie about administering shock And obedience dropped to under 20%
Sometimes participant would also administer a lower shock…
Consider though- would this happen in genocide?

15. 3. Location Obedience dropped to 48%
Abandoned factory VS Yale university
Obedience dropped to 48%

16. 4. Social support obedience seen: 10%
Support from 3 teachers- when they refused to administer, so did the participant

17. 5: Choice
When the teacher could choose their own shock level, obedience little as 3%...

18. Personality/ dispositional factors
Adorno- German Soldiers
Handout (A3) :

19. 8: does this study shed light on why people obey
Positives
Negatives