milgram's study of obedience
Milgram’s study of obedience to authority, and the ethical issues it raised for social psychologists
The following essay will discuss psychologist Stanley Milgram’s study of obedience to authority, and will outline the ethical issues it raised for social psychologists. Milgram was inspired by the Nuremburg trials and the defense of many ex-nazis being that they were coerced into assisting the genocide by simply following orders from higher authority figures. Milgram set out to see if ordinary volunteers could be coerced into taking actions which went against their own moral judgement if they were ordeed to do so by an authority figure and assured that they would not be held responsible for any negative consequences. The participant’s willingness was also measured in the experiment. The experiment was controversial, received much criticisism and raised several ethical issues, including post traumatic stress and skewed self image of participants, the right to withdraw from the experiment not being made clear to participants and, particularly, deception of participants. The experiment and these issues will be discussed further in the following paragraphs.
Milgram attended highschool in the 1950s and was concerned with the possibility of another holocaust occuring in the U.S. and a Hitler-esque dictator ordering youths to do things against their personal judgement. When classmates saw this idea as ridiculous and impossible, he said “how do you know unless you were put in the situation?”. (Zimbardo, D. P. (n.d.). Stanley Millgram: Obedience to Authority, Retrieved november 3, 2013 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9l_puxcrlM) In everyday life we obey authority and it is seen as normal. If situations arise where there is a shift in the norms of society and obeying authority means harming or killing innocent human beings, how does one know how they would react? This question obviously stayed with Milgram, and was the inspiration behind his experiment.
The
The following essay will discuss psychologist Stanley Milgram’s study of obedience to authority, and will outline the ethical issues it raised for social psychologists. Milgram was inspired by the Nuremburg trials and the defense of many ex-nazis being that they were coerced into assisting the genocide by simply following orders from higher authority figures. Milgram set out to see if ordinary volunteers could be coerced into taking actions which went against their own moral judgement if they were ordeed to do so by an authority figure and assured that they would not be held responsible for any negative consequences. The participant’s willingness was also measured in the experiment. The experiment was controversial, received much criticisism and raised several ethical issues, including post traumatic stress and skewed self image of participants, the right to withdraw from the experiment not being made clear to participants and, particularly, deception of participants. The experiment and these issues will be discussed further in the following paragraphs.
Milgram attended highschool in the 1950s and was concerned with the possibility of another holocaust occuring in the U.S. and a Hitler-esque dictator ordering youths to do things against their personal judgement. When classmates saw this idea as ridiculous and impossible, he said “how do you know unless you were put in the situation?”. (Zimbardo, D. P. (n.d.). Stanley Millgram: Obedience to Authority, Retrieved november 3, 2013 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9l_puxcrlM) In everyday life we obey authority and it is seen as normal. If situations arise where there is a shift in the norms of society and obeying authority means harming or killing innocent human beings, how does one know how they would react? This question obviously stayed with Milgram, and was the inspiration behind his experiment.
The
References: Baumrind, D. (1964). Some Thoughts on Ethics of Research: After Reading Milgram 's Behavioral Study of Obedience, American Psychologist, 19: 421-423 Holt, N., Bremner, A.,Sutherland, E.,Vliek, M., Passer, M. & Smith, R. (2012). social thinking and behaviour. In N. Jacobs (Ed.), psychology the science of mind and behaviour (2nd ed., pp. 528). berkshire, U.K.: McGraw Hill. (Original work published 2012) Zimbardo, D. P. (n.d.). Stanley Millgram: Obedience to Authority, Retrieved november 3, 2013 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9l_puxcrlM