Factors Affecting Obedience and Dissent (Edexcel A-Level Psychology): Revision Notes

Factors Affecting Obedience and Dissent

Milgram's experimental series demonstrated that ordinary individuals can inflict harm when instructed by an authority figure, challenging the notion that German soldiers during World War II possessed unique character traits that made them more compliant. The baseline obedience rate of 65% (found in Experiments 1 and 5) revealed that various factors within the situation itself, as well as individual differences, can either increase or decrease levels of obedience and dissent.

Situational factors

Situational factors are elements within the environment or context that influence behaviour, independent of individual personality traits.

Momentum of compliance

This factor involves beginning with minor, seemingly trivial requests, which causes participants to commit themselves to the experimental procedure. As demands escalate, participants feel duty-bound to continue. The same principle applied to the shock generator in Milgram's experiments, where initial shocks were small (15 volts) but increased gradually in 15-volt increments.

Proximity

Proximity refers to the physical or psychological distance between the authority figure and the participant, or between the participant and the victim.

The closer the authority figure, the higher the level of obedience observed. Distance appeared to act as a buffer to obedience, as demonstrated in the telephonic instruction condition where the experimenter gave orders remotely. When the authority figure was physically distant, obedience rates dropped.

The proximity of the victim also influenced obedience levels. When the learner occupied the same room as the teacher, or when the teacher had to physically place the learner's hand onto a shock plate, obedience decreased. This contrasted sharply with the pilot study, where the learner was in a different room and could not be seen or heard throughout, resulting in 100% obedience.

Status of the authority

Milgram argued that obedience can only be established when the authority figure is perceived as legitimate (having genuine and justifiable power or status). This was confirmed when experiments were conducted at Yale University, a prestigious institution that lent credibility to the research.

Personal responsibility

Milgram believed that participants would show higher obedience in situations where personal responsibility is removed and transferred onto the shoulders of an authority figure. In a variation study, participants had to sign a contract stating they were taking part of their own free will and relinquishing any legal responsibility from Yale University. This explicit assumption of personal responsibility resulted in obedience falling to 40%, a notable decrease from the baseline 65%.

Individual differences in obedience

While situational factors play a major role, individual characteristics can also influence whether someone obeys or dissents.

Personality

Milgram conducted follow-up investigations on participants from the original experiments (Experiments 1–4) to determine whether certain individuals would be more likely to obey or dissent. In one study, 118 participants who had been both obedient and disobedient were asked to judge the relative responsibility for administering the shocks among the experimenter, the teacher, and the learner. They indicated their judgements by moving three hands on a round disc to show proportionate responsibility.

Locus of control

Dissenting individuals appear to take more personal blame, whereas obedient people are more likely to displace blame onto others. This pattern can be explained by Rotter's (1966) locus of control personality theory, which outlines two different personality types: those with an internal locus of control and those with an external locus of control.

This framework aligns with Milgram's findings: obedient people have an external locus of control. Not only are they more likely to be influenced by an authority figure, but they also believe they are not responsible for their actions. Dissenters, conversely, are more resistant to authority and more likely to take personal responsibility for their actions, suggesting an internal locus of control.

Authoritarian personality

The authoritarian personality will be discussed in more detail in relation to prejudice, but it also helps explain why some individuals are more obedient than others. An authoritarian personality is typically submissive to authority but harsh to those seen as subordinate to themselves. Theodor Adorno et al. (1950) devised the F-Scale (Fascism Scale) to detect the authoritarian personality. Fascism refers to extreme intolerant views based on a right-wing political perspective.

Stanley Milgram and Alan Elms (1966) compared the F-Scale scores for 20 obedient and 20 defiant participants involved in Milgram's experiments. They found that the obedient participants had a higher F-Scale score, indicating an authoritarian personality type, compared to the dissenters. This suggests that those with authoritarian tendencies are predisposed to obey authority figures.

Michaël Dambrun and Elise Vatiné (2010) conducted a simulation of Milgram's experiment using a virtual environment and computer simulation. They found that authoritarianism was linked to obedience. Those with high authoritarian scores were less likely to withdraw from the study, perhaps because they were submissive to the authority of the experimenter or showed an inclination to punish the failing learner.

Empathy

It is believed that people who have high levels of empathy (the ability to understand and share the feelings of another) would be less likely to harm another person at the instructions of an authority figure.

Gender

Milgram used predominantly male participants in his experiments, although he did conduct one experiment (Experiment 8) that involved 40 women. Previous research had indicated that females were more compliant than males, yet traditionally we think of women as less aggressive. This contradiction would be tested in an experiment that commanded both compliance and aggression.

Milgram found that females were virtually identical to males in their level of obedience (65% for males and 65% for females at the 300-volt level and beyond). Yet their rated level of anxiety was much higher than males for those who were obedient. This was also found in Burger's (2009) replication of the experiment.

However, in a review of 10 obedience studies, Blass (1999) found that obedience levels between males and females were consistent across nine of the studies. The study that did not show a similar male/female obedience level was conducted by Kilham and Mann (1974) in a direct replication of Milgram's experiment in Australia. They found females to be far less obedient (16%) than male participants (40%). Although this could have been a result of male teachers being paired with male learners and female teachers with female learners, perhaps the females joined together against the situation in an alliance to react against the demands of the aggressive male experimenter.

Culture

Many behaviours vary across cultures. Culture can be divided broadly into two types: individualistic and collectivistic cultures. Individualistic cultures, such as America and Britain, tend to behave more independently and resist conformity or compliance. Collectivistic cultures, such as China or Israel, tend to behave as a collective group based on interdependence, meaning that cooperation and compliance are important for the stability of the group (Smith and Bond, 1998). We could assume from this that collectivistic cultures are more likely to be obedient.

Thomas Blass (1999) conducted a full review of obedience research (see Table 1.2 below), analysing research 35 years after Milgram's first series of experiments. His data can be analysed in terms of cultural differences using research employing similar methodology to Milgram.

Researcher	Country	Percentage of full obedience
Milgram (1962)	US	65%
Edwards et al. (1969)	South Africa	87.5%
Bock (1972)	US	40%
Kilham and Mann (1974)	Australia	28%
Shanab and Yahya (1977)	Jordan	73%
Miranda et al. (1981)	Spain	50%
Schurz (1985)	Austria	80%
Ancona and Pareyson (1968)	Italy	85%
Burley and McGuiness (1977)	UK	50%

For example, Ancona and Pareyson's (1968) maximum shock level was 330 volts, compared to Milgram's 450 volts. Milgram found 73% obedience in his proximity studies, which is more comparable to the 85% found in Italy, suggesting that 330 volts was perceived to be as less dangerous. In Italy, only student participants were used, which Milgram actively avoided because of their compliant and competitive nature. A similar comparison can be made of Burley and McGuiness (1977), who used only 20 students and a maximum voltage of 225.