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Stanley Milgram's Effect On Civil Disobedience

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Psychologist, Stanley Milgram, wanted to know if people would cause harm on other humans simply because they were ordered to do so (he was inspired by Nazi soldiers, who corrected their actions in World War II by saying they were just following orders). Milgram designed an experiment where participants were told they were testing a learning technique, where a student had to learn a word pattern, and were punished by electric shock if they got the answer wrong. The “student” was an assistant of Milgram’s, but the participant, who was the “teacher” and the person to give the electric shock, thought this person was just an innocent participant. The teacher would read out a question, and if the student (who sat in an adjacent room, where they …show more content…

the student is unconscious/dead). Milgram wanted to see how far the participants would go with the shocks before they stopped the experiment. If they continued to order shocks, just because that was the rules of the experiment, Milgram claimed this would prove that people will commit acts of violence simply because they were ordered to do so. The results were that all participants continued to administer shocks well into the range at which the student was screaming in pain, and around 60% kept going until “XXX”. At the time, the Milgram experiment ethics seemed reasonable, but by modern day psychology, this experiment would have never been allowed today. Milgram’s generation needed conclusive answers about the “final solution”. Standard ethics in modern day psychology state that participants in any experiment must not be deceived, and that they must be made aware of any consequences. In fairness, research performed after the experiment, indicated that there were no long term psychological effects on the participants. However, the fact that these “teachers” thought that they had caused suffering to another human being, could have caused severe emotional

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In the book “Opening Skinner’s Box”, Lauren Slater discusses many complicated ideas relating to certain experiments of recent times. In every chapter, she focuses on one specific experiment and poses many controversial thoughts. One of the chapters I found most interesting was the second chapter titled “Obscura”. In it she walks readers through the experiments of Stanley Milgram and questions the purpose, results, usefulness, and morality of the experiments. To begin, the purpose of the experiments seem to be off to me.

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During the 1960’s Stanley Milgram conducted a series of experiments to test how a person reacts to authority. He started these tests in response to World War Two and the reports of the German soldiers who claimed they were “just following orders’ when asked about

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He saw that the more personal, or close, the real participant had to be to the fake one, while they were being shocked, affected the obedience as well. He also noticed that if there were two other fake participants teaching that refused to shock their learners that the real participant would not comply. Finally, he tested the experimenter telling the real patient to shock the learner by telephone, instead of actually being there in person, reduced obedience as well (McLead). The Milgram experiment and the Nuremburg trials can relate extensively to explain how the Holocaust happened the way it did.

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Like Psychologist Diana Baumrind did so in her article “Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments”. Where she makes it very clear that she disagrees with causing individuals stress and discomfort. In her article, Baumrind states “It is potentially harmful to a subject to commit, on the course of an experiment, acts which he himself considers unworthy, particularly when he has been entrapped into committing such acts by an individual he has reason to trust” which in this case the trustworthy individual would be Stanley Milgram. Baumrind also worried about the dangers of the serious aftereffects that may ensure because of the stress and discomfort Stanley Milgram’s experiment has caused. Even though Stanley Milgram states that “After the interview, procedures were undertaken to assure that the subject would leave the laboratory in a state of well-being.”

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Milgram said “For the teacher, the situation quickly becomes one of gripping tension. It is not a game for him: conflict is intense obvious. The manifest suffering of the learner presses him to quit: but each time he hesitates to administer a shock, the experimenter orders him to

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On day six Zimbardo and Milgram decided to conclude the experiment. Zimbardo originally intended to explore how prisoners adapt to powerlessness, but he has contended that the experiment demonstrates how swiftly arbitrary assignment of power can lead to abuse. (Maher, The anatomy of obedience. P. 408) Once the experiment was completed Zimbardo and Milgram concluded that generally people will conform to the roles they are told to play.

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Stanley milgram conducted a study to see who is really responsible for the actions of the holocaust. In this experiment there were two people, a learner or a teacher. The learner would sit in a electric chair while the teacher would hold a control panel with buttons on it. The teacher thought when he pushed the buttons on the panel it would shock the student. The student received shock but not enough to physically damage.

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While arguably one of the defining psychological studies of the 20th Century, the research was not without flaws. Almost immediately the study became a subject for debate amongst psychologists who argued that the research was both ethically flawed and its lack of diversity meant it could not be generalized. Ethically, a significant critique of the experiment is that the participants actually believed they were administering serious harm to a real person, completely unaware that the learner was in fact acting. Although Milgram argued that the illusion was a necessary part of the experiment to study the participants’ reaction, they were exposed to a highly stressful situation. Many were visibly distraught throughout the duration of the test

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In his article “The Experiment of Autonomy,” Stanley Milgram describes the findings of his famous ‘Milgram’s Experiment.’ In the experiment, Milgram hired actors to act as students and asked random people to take the role teacher. The teacher would administer a word memory test to the student and would shock the student when they answered the question incorrectly. The actors, although not actually being shocked, would scream with more and more each shock and eventually refused to answer, during which time they were shocked again. Meanwhile, the ‘scientist’ encouraged the teacher to continue by simply saying “The experiment requires you to go on…”

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"Obedience is behavior that complies with the explicit demands of the individual in authority." (King, 448) If a store manager tells you to put a shirt on before entering the store, you're more than likely going to comply due to their request due to their authority over the store. You might fear that if you do not comply, you won't be permitted inside or even police being called. That is simple obedience, but what if an authority figure asked you to inflict pain on another person?

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This experiment was to help Milgram figure out if one is willing to give

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Stanley Milgram’s “Experiments on Obedience” is possibly the most famous psychology experiment ever performed; additionally, it is also one of the most controversial and disputed experiments. In Diana Baumrind’s “Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience,” she uses her own expertise to challenge the techniques used, ethics, and conclusions made from the experiment. On the other hand, Ian Parker in his article “Obedience” challenges similar ideas to Baumrind’s; however, Parker uses the opinions of numerous professionals in his article to back up his claims. While the experiment is one of the most famous psychological experiments, both Parker and Baumrind question the ethics of what is performed in the experiments, the manner in which

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Milgram tries to disprove this theory continuously throughout his experiments. In chapter 11, Milgram allowed the subject to choose the voltage on the shocks administered to the learner. The average amount of voltage used was 75. However, one must take in consideration that the voltage was still administered to the subject. Three of the subjects administered 15 volts of electricity to the learner.

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Milgram Study The Milgram study was very interesting to read and watch videos about. Milgram wanted to leave a lasting impression on the psychology world and he definitely achieved that goal. Some people think that this experiment was inhumane and others thought that it was a good experiment to learn from. Milgram’s purpose in this experiment was to see how people would react to an authority figure telling them what to do even if it was wrong and against their morals.

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The Milgram experiment was conducted to analyze obedience to authority figures. The experiment was conducted on men from varying ages and varying levels of education. The participants were told that they would be teaching other participants to memorize a pair of words. They believed that this was an experiment that was being conducted to measure the effect that punishment has on learning, because of this they were told they had to electric shock the learner every time that they answered a question wrong. The experiment then sought out to measure with what willingness the participants obeyed the authority figure, even when they were instructed to commit actions which they seemed uncomfortable with.

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