Obedience

1
Obedience

• Majority minority influence do not always
  involve a deliberate attempt to change someones
  behaviour
• Obedience always involves a direct attempt by one
  person to control another

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2
Obedience

• Complying with or deferring to a request or
  order from a legitimate authority

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3
Studies of Obedience

• Milgram (1963)
• A study of destructive obedience to authority
• Involved giving people orders to hurt and
  possibly kill an innocent stranger

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4
Milgram Study video clip goes here
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5
Variations on Milgram

• Female PPs 65
• Victim screaming 62.5
• Visible victim 40
• Physical contact 30
• Experimenter absent 22
• Run down office 45
• Disobedient confeds 10
• Confed gives shocks 95

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6
Factors in Destructive Obedience

• Several factors increase a persons tendency to
  obey an authority
• Legitimacy of the authority
• Social isolation
• Buffers between aggressor victim
• Gradual commitment

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7
Agency Theory (Milgram, 1963)

• People have two ways of acting
• Autonomous they direct their own behaviour, and
  take responsibility for the results
• Agentic they allow someone else to direct their
  behaviour, and assume that responsibility passes
  to that person

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8
Responsibility video clip goes here
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9
Agency Theory

• We act agentically when the situation or social
  role we are in seems to demand it
• E.g. when given an order by someone wearing a
  uniform

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10
Resisting Obedience

• Educate people
• Students who knew about the Milgram research were
  less likely to obey in a similar study (Gross,
  1992)
• Remind people of their responsibilities
• When Milgrams PPs were reminded that they were
  responsible, almost none obeyed

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11
Resisting Obedience

• Give social support
• In the disobedient confeds version, obedience
  was much lower
• Attack the authoritys credibility
• Obedience relies on perceived legitimacy

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