Contributor© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Obviously, Nazi criminals were not monsters, but normal citizens and caring fathers who were willing to commit most cruel crimes. What has been done to bring them there? The New York psychologist Stanley Milgram (1963) was impressed by the fact that so many people in Germany showed obedience to the Nazi-regime and complied with most cruel orders. How could it happen that the regime was able to maintain the whole network of concentration and death camps?Stanley Milgram (1963)

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority A well-known example is Adolf Eichmann, who played a key role in the organization of the Holocaust. In her book “Eichmann in Jerusalem” sketches Hannah Arendt (1963) the picture of a normal man who was able to commit these crimes. She coined the term “banality of evil“. Can the “banality of evil” be shown experimentally? Even those at the top of the hierarchy who organized the Holocaust were not especially perverse or sadistic, as many people believed after World War II.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Two participants entered the laboratory; one of them was a confederate of the experimenter. They were told that this is an experiment about punishment and learning, and that one will be the learner, the other the teacher who has to punish after failed learning attempts. Both drew a paper slip in order to determine who is teacher; on both slips stood „Teacher“. Milgram conducted the following experiment:

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Teacher and learner were brought to an adjacent room. There, the teacher fixed arms and legs of the learner, attached the cables, and then went to the experiment room. Thus, the real participant was always the teacher who had to present the learning task, check the answer, give feedback (right or wrong) and administer electric shocks.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority E = Experimenter T = Teacher (participant in the experiment) L = Learner (confederate of experimenter) The participant sat before the equipment to administer electric shocks:

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority SlightModerateStrongVery IntenseExtremeDanger: XXX ShockShockShockStrong ShockIntensity Severe ShockShockShock ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө ө 15V 300V lever If the learner presses the lever (e.g., 300 V) 420V

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority The teacher got the task to administer an electric shock for each error the learner committed, beginning with a 15V shock and then increasing by 15V for each further error. The teacher got a trial shock of 45V, which is rather painful. Unbeknownst to the teacher, no real current did flow through the cables to the learner, who was the apparent victim.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority In the original experiment, the learner did not give any vocal feedback, but at 300V pounded on the wall, which was repeated at 315V. After that, the learner no longer responded to the learning task. The learner was instructed to give answers according to a schedule of approximately three wrong answers to one correct answer.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority If the participant turned to the experimenter and asked him what to do, which was typically the case after the learner pounded on the wall, the experimenter responded with some prepared answers, such as:

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority  Please continue or Please go on  The experiment requires that you continue  It is absolutely essential that you continue  You have no other choice, you must go on The participants were assured that the shocks may be painful, but would not cause any permanent tissue damage. Here a graphic summary of the experiment: (Click once on next slide to begin)

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Separation Wall (learner invisible, no vocal feedback) Experimenter Teacher (real participant) Learner (mock participant) Shock generator (Commits an error) Wrong! Pound on the wall! What now? Please go on

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Over 60% of the participants went to the highest level: 450 Volt! 100% went up to 300 Volt! Question: What do you believe, how many of the 100 participants went up to the upper end of the scale – 450 Volts?

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority This study clearly revealed the banality of the evil: Normal American citizens committed a cruelty that hitherto has been thought to be exceptional. In a later investigation, Milgram found that participants indeed believed that the learners were in pain and did not notice that learners only simulated pain. Later studies examined the effect of closeness to the victim, closeness to the experimenter, and reputation of the institution on the willingness to comply (Milgram, 1965).

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Most participants obeyed the experimenter. Some did not feel much tension, whereas others felt visibly uneasy, especially when administering intense electric shocks. Frequently, participants were observed to be in an agitated and even angered state because they felt a conflict between obeying the authority and obeying their own conscience. On the following slide, an observer to the experiment reports the reaction of a participant in the Milgram experiment:

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority I observed a mature and initially poised businessman enter the laboratory smiling and confident. Within 20 minutes he was reduced to a twitching, stuttering wreck, who was rapidly approaching a point of nervous collapse. He constantly pulled on his earlobe, and twisted his hands. At one point he pushed his fists into his forehead and muttered: „Oh God, let‘s stop it.“ And yet he continued to respond to every word of the experimenter, and obeyed to the end.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority The Milgram study elicited heated debates about ethical issues in psychological research, and raised questions such as: Could the participants who played the teacher be harmed? Milgram later asked the 100 former participants of his studies, but only one expressed regret over participation in the experiment. Eighty four were happy about their participation, and many said that they have learned something about themselves.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Some scholars proposed to use methods that harm the self-esteem of the participants less than the Milgram studies have done. However, later studies by Milgram (1965) have shown that there is no alternative to the original experimental setup: Both expert judgments and role-plays, where participants were informed about the true nature of the experiment, could not replicate the results and underestimated compliance massively.

© POSbase 2005 Obedience to Authority Other studies showed that participants in other countries, such as Australia, South Africa, and different European countries, reacted similarly. In a German study, 85% of the participants went up to the maximum shock intensity. As it is forbidden to do the Milgram study nowadays, we do not know whether people would react the same way. What do you think?