1. MILGRAM’S EXPERIMENT A STUDY IN OBEDIENCE

2. What was the Experiment? The Milgram Experiment was a social psychology experiment conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram. It measured the willingness of participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that possibly conflicted with their personal conscience. Stanley Milgram

3. Milgram’s Experiment The experiments began in July 1961, three months after the start of the trial of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann. Milgram devised the experiments to answer the question: "Could it be that Eichmann and his million accomplices in the Holocaust were just following orders?”

4. Experiment Participants There were three roles in the experiment: 1.Experimenter 2.Teacher 3.Learner In this experiment, both the experimenter and the learner were actors following a script. The only person really being experimented on was the “teacher.”

5. The Experimenter and Learner The role of the experimenter was played by a stern, impassive biology teacher dressed in a technician's coat, and the learner was played by an Irish-American accountant trained to act for the role.

6. The Setup The participant and the learner were told by the experimenter that they would be participating in an experiment helping his study of memory and learning in different situations. Two slips of paper were then presented to the participant and to the actor. The participant was led to believe that one of the slips said "learner" and the other said "teacher," and that he and the actor had been given the slips randomly. In reality, both said “teacher.”

7. Strapping Down the Learner The “teacher” then had to help strap the “learner” into a chair and attach electrical clamps to him. The “learner” was sure to mention the fact that he had a heart condition.

8. Separation The “teacher” and the experimenter then went to a connected, room. The "teacher" was given a 45-volt electric shock from the electro-shock generator as a sample of the shock that the "learner" would supposedly receive during the experiment.

9. The “Test” The "teacher" was then given a list of word pairs which he was to teach the learner. The teacher began by reading the list of word pairs to the learner. The teacher would then read the first word of each pair and read four possible answers. The learner would press a button to indicate his response. If the answer was incorrect, the teacher would administer a shock to the learner, with the voltage increasing for each wrong answer. If correct, the teacher would read the next word pair.

10. The Room Setup

11. Deception The subjects believed that for each wrong answer, the learner was receiving actual shocks. In reality, there were no shocks. After the confederate was separated from the subject, the confederate set up a tape recorder integrated with the electro-shock generator, which played pre-recorded sounds for each shock level.

12. Low Level Shock After a number of voltage level increases, the actor started to bang on the wall that separated him from the subject. After several times banging on the wall and complaining about his heart condition, all responses by the learner would cease.

13. Early Reactions At this point, many people indicated their desire to stop the experiment and check on the learner. Some test subjects paused at 135 volts and began to question the purpose of the experiment. Most continued after being assured that they would not be held responsible.

14. Small Prompts If at any time the subject indicated his desire to halt the experiment, he was given a succession of verbal prods by the experimenter, in this order: “Please continue” “The experiment requires that you continue” “It is absolutely essential that you continue” “You have no other choice, you must go on”

15. Putting a Stop to Things If the subject still wished to stop after all four successive verbal prods, the experiment was halted. Otherwise, it was halted after the subject had given the maximum 450-volt shock three times in succession.

16. Truly Shocking In Milgram's first set of experiments, 65 percent (26 of 40) of experiment participants administered the experiment's final 450-volt shock, though many were very uncomfortable doing so – At some point, every participant paused and questioned the experiment. However, no participant completly refused to administer shocks before 300-volts.

17. Perception vs. Reality During a conference, before to reveal what the participants did, Milgram asked how they would have reacted in such a situation. Unanimously they replied that they would have stopped despite of the experimenter's orders at less than 300V. 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 nervous collapse. He constantly pulled on his ear lobe and twisted his hands. At one point he pushed his fist into his forehead and muttered “Oh God, lets stop it.” And yet he continued to respond to every word of the experimenter, and obeyed to the end.”

18. Milgram’s Experiment Watch footage of Milgram’s experiment.

19. Interpretations By modern standards, Milgram’s study was unethical. Nonetheless, it still remains a landmark experiment in psychology. From this experiment, Milgram developed two critical theories:

20. Theory of Conformism: A subject who has neither ability nor expertise to make decisions, especially in a crisis, will leave decision making to the group and its hierarchy. The group is the person's behavioral model. Agentic State Theory: The essence of obedience consists in the fact that a person comes to view himself as the instrument for carrying out another person's wishes, and he therefore no longer sees himself as responsible for his actions.

21. The Stanford Prison Experiment An Experiment in Social Psychology AP Psychology Mr. Tusow

22. The Arrest On a quiet Sunday morning in August, a police car swept through the town picking up college students as part of a mass arrest for armed robbery and burglary. The suspects were picked up at their home, charged, spread- eagled against the police car, searched, and handcuffed.

23. Booking and Holding Cells The car arrived at the police station, the suspects were brought inside, formally booked, read their Miranda Rights, finger printed, and a complete identification was made. – The suspects were then taken to a holding cell where they were left blindfolded for as long as two hours.

24. Volunteering for the Experiment College students answered a newspaper ad asking for volunteers in a study of the psychological effects of prison life, in an experiment designed by Philip Zimbardo, a Stanford psychology professor. More than 70 applicants answered the ad and were given diagnostic interviews and personality tests to eliminate candidates with psychological problems, medical disabilities, or a history of crime. – 24 college students from the U.S. and Canada who happened to be in the Stanford area were selected and set to earn $15/day.

25. Constructing the Experiment The prison was constructed by boarding up each end of a corridor in the basement of Stanford's Psychology Department building. – That corridor was "The Yard" and was the only place where prisoners were allowed to walk around, eat, or exercise. – Cells were made from laboratory rooms with specially made doors with steel bars and cell numbers.

26. Humiliation Each prisoner was systematically searched and stripped naked. He was then deloused with a spray, to convey the belief that they may have germs or lice.

27. Humiliation The prisoner was then issued a uniform. The main part of this uniform was a dress, or smock, which each prisoner wore at all times with no underclothes. On the smock, in front and in back, was his prison ID number. On each prisoner's right ankle was a heavy chain, bolted on and worn at all times.

28. Becoming a Prisoner The chain on their foot was used in order to remind prisoners of the oppressiveness of their environment. – When a prisoner turned over, the chain would hit his leg, waking him up and reminding him that he was still in prison. The process of having one's head shaved is designed in part to minimize each person's individuality. It is also a way of getting people to begin complying with the arbitrary, coercive rules of the institution.

29. Enforcing the Law The guards were free, within limits, to do whatever they thought was necessary to maintain law and order in the prison. – The guards made their own set of rules. All guards were dressed in identical uniforms of khaki, and wore a whistle around their neck and a Billy club borrowed from the police. – Guards also wore mirror sunglasses which prevented anyone from seeing their eyes or reading their emotions.

30. In the Cells The experiment began with nine guards and nine prisoners in the jail. Three guards worked each of three eight-hour shifts, while three prisoners occupied each of the three barren cells around the clock. The cells were so small that there was room for only three cots on which the prisoners slept or sat, with room for little else.

31. Asserting Authority At 2:30 A.M. prisoners were awakened from sleep by blasting whistles for the first of many "counts." The counts served as a way to familiarizing the prisoners with their numbers. – More importantly, they provided a regular occasion for the guards to exercise control over the prisoners.

32. Physical Punishment Push-ups were a common form of physical punishment imposed by the guards, for infractions of the rules or displays of improper attitudes toward the guards or institution. One of the guards stepped on the prisoners' backs while they did push-ups, or made other prisoners sit on the backs of fellow prisoners doing their push-ups.

33. Asserting Independence Because the first day passed without incident, the guards were surprised and totally unprepared for the rebellion which broke out on the morning of the second day. – Prisoners removed their stocking caps, ripped off their numbers, and barricaded themselves inside the cells by putting their beds against the door The guards were angered and frustrated because the prisoners began to taunt and curse them. When the morning shift of guards came on, they became upset at the night shift who, they felt, must have been too lenient.

34. Putting Down the Rebellion The guards called in reinforcements. The three guards who were waiting on stand-by duty came in and the night shift of guards voluntarily remained on duty. The guards broke into each cell, stripped the prisoners naked, took the beds out, forced the ringleaders of the prisoner rebellion into solitary confinement.

35. Special Privileges One of the three cells was designated as a "privilege cell." The three prisoners least involved in the rebellion were given special privileges. ▫ Given back their uniforms and beds and were allowed to wash and brush their teeth. Privileged prisoners also got to eat special food in the presence of the other prisoners who had temporarily lost the privilege of eating. ▫ The effect was to break the solidarity among prisoners.

36. Consequences of Rebellion The prisoners' rebellion played an important role in producing greater solidarity among the guards. It was no longer just an experiment, Now guards saw the prisoners as troublemakers who were out to get them, who might really cause them some harm. In response to this threat, the guards began increasing their control, surveillance, and aggression.

37. Prisoner #8612 Less than 36 hours into the experiment, Prisoner #8612 began suffering from acute emotional disturbance, disorganized thinking, uncontrollable crying and rage. After a meeting with the guards where they told him he was weak, but offered him “informant” status, #8612 returned to the other prisoners and said “You can't leave. You can't quit.” Soon #8612 “began to act ‘crazy,’ to scream, to curse, to go into a rage that seemed out of control.” ▫ It wasn’t until this point that the psychologists realized they had to let him out.

38. A Visit from Parents The next day, they held a visiting hour for parents and friends. They were worried that when the parents saw the state of they jail, they might insist on taking their sons home. – Guards washed the prisoners, had them clean and polish their cells, fed them a big dinner and played music on the intercom.

39. Stepping Things Up After the visit, rumor spread of a mass escape plan. Afraid that they would lose the prisoners, the guards and experimenters tried to enlist the help and facilities of the Palo Alto police department. The guards again escalated the level of harassment, forcing them to do menial, repetitive work such as cleaning toilets with their bare hands.

40. An Informant in the Prison The guards had become so immersed in the simulation they started getting paranoid. In an attempt to stop further “plots,” the guards planted an informant within the prison.

41. Falling Further From Reality Zimbardo invited a Catholic priest who had been a prison chaplain to evaluate how realistic our prison situation was. The chaplain interviewed each prisoner individually. The priest told them the only way they would get out was with the help if a lawyer. Half the prisoners introduced themselves by number rather than name.

42. Prisoner #819 The only prisoner who did not want to speak to the priest was Prisoner #819, who was feeling sick, had refused to eat, and wanted to see a doctor rather than a priest. Eventually while talking to the priest, #819 broke down and began to cry hysterically, just as had the other two boys released earlier. The psychologists removed the chain off his foot, the cap off his head, and told him to go and rest in a room that was adjacent to the prison yard. They told him they would get him some food and then take him to see a doctor.

43. Prisoner #819 While this was going on, one of the guards lined up the other prisoners and had them chant aloud: "Prisoner #819 is a bad prisoner. Because of what Prisoner #819 did, my cell is a mess, Mr. Correctional Officer." The psychologists realized #819 could hear the chanting and went back into the room where they found him sobbing uncontrollably. The psychologists tried to get him to agree to leave the experiment, but he said he could not leave because the others had labeled him a bad prisoner.

44. Back to Reality At that point, Zimbardo said, "Listen, you are not #819. You are [his name], and my name is Dr. Zimbardo. I am a psychologist, not a prison superintendent, and this is not a real prison. This is just an experiment, and those are students, not prisoners, just like you. Let's go." He stopped crying suddenly, looked up and replied, "Okay, let's go,“ as if nothing had been wrong.

45. An End to the Experiment Christina Maslach, a recent Stanford Ph.D. brought in to conduct interviews with the guards and prisoners, strongly objected when she saw our prisoners being treated so poorly. – Out of 50 or more outsiders who had seen our prison, she was the only one who ever questioned its morality. Once she countered the power of the situation, however, it became clear that the study should be ended. Maslach was dating Zimbardo at the time. They are still married to this day.

46. In the End “By the end of the study, the prisoners were disintegrated, both as a group and as individuals. There was no longer any group unity; just a bunch of isolated individuals hanging on, much like prisoners of war or hospitalized mental patients. The guards had won total control of the prison, and they commanded the blind obedience of each prisoner.” -Philip Zimbardo

47. The End of the Experiment After only six days, the planned two-week prison simulation was called off. Do we see similarities to present day?

48. Discussion Questions If you were a guard, what type of guard would you have become? How sure are you? If you were a prisoner, would you have been able to endure the experience? What would you have done differently than those subjects did? What factors would lead prisoners to attribute guard brutality to the guards' disposition or character, rather than to the situation?

49. Discussion Questions What are the effects of living in an environment with no clocks, no view of the outside world, and minimal sensory stimulation? Consider the psychological consequences of stripping, delousing, and shaving the heads of prisoners or members of the military. What transformations take place when people go through an experience like this? After the study, how do you think the prisoners and guards felt? If you were the experimenter in charge, would you have done this study? Would you have terminated it earlier? Would you have conducted a follow-up study?