1. Chapter 7: Conformity
Part 2: March 8, 2012

2. Compliance Make direct requests of us & hope we comply
Differs from conformity:
Sometimes we mindlessly comply
Strategies for compliance?
Use the reciprocity norm – repay someone a favor
Immediate vs. delayed effects?

3. Sequential Requests: Foot-in-the-door technique: start w/small request
Example?
Based on self-perception?
Lowballing technique: agreement then change the deal
Door-in-the face technique: start w/big request then smaller request
How is contrast effect at work?

4. Obedience Compliance through direct orders.
Examples:
Milgram’s research on obedience:
Controversial set of experiments on obeying authority and causing others’ pain (1963)
1 subject, 1 confederate, 1 experimenter at Yale
Subject must ‘teach’ confederate list of words
Punishment?

5. What were the ‘teachers’ instructions?
How did confederate (‘learner’) react?
What happened if confederate protested?
Results?
Next study - confederate with “heart problem”
What % still complied?

6. See Fig 7.7 Impact of situation on obedience rates: Location
Experimenter characteristics
Closeness to victim
Disobedient others

7. Reasons for Obedience? Normative & Info sources in Milgram’s study?
1. Conforming to the wrong norm
2. Cognitive Dissonance
3. Loss of personal responsibility

8. Ethics of Milgram’s Work
Criticisms of the studies?
What did Milgram argue about the benefits?
What did participants report 1 yr later?

9. Follow-ups to Milgram’s study
Replications –
Burger’s (2009) experiment: partial replication using up to 150 volts (rather than 450 max)
Similarity to Milgram
Differences from Milgram?
Results?
Milgram’s “choose any level of shock” variation -

10. Most people make the FAE when reading Milgram’s studies
How so?

11. Application: Cult Behavior and the Jonestown Massacre
1978 mass suicide at “Jonestown” as obedience example…
People’s Temple with Jim Jones as leader moved from SF to S. American jungle.
910 people killed themselves on Jones’ command
Many explanations focus on Jones’ charisma.
Situational explanations?