Groups

1
Groups ObedienceThe Milgram Experiment

• Sociology
• Ms. Blackhurst

2
Todays Plan

• Turn in Status and Roles Worksheet from
  Wednesday
• Warm-up
• PICK UP A COPY OF THE SCIENCE OF EVIL FROM THE
  FRONT DESK!!!Complete the reading question
  activity on the Milgram Stanford Experiments.
• Class work
• ABC Primetime Special The Science of Evil
• Note/Question Activity
• 8 more school days until Spring Break!!!!

3
Warm-up

• What would it take to make you do something that
  you normally would not?
• Why do people do stupid things when joining a
  frat during pledge week?

4
Reason for the Activity Yesterday

• Sociologists study groups of people, not just
  individuals
• Where you fit in a group can change how others
  act when they are with you
• Were you the leader? The teacher? The submissive
  group member?
• This experiment shows how people react when they
  are given a new social status and social role.

5
Primetime Basic Instincts Video The Science of
Evil

• 'Primetime' Re-Creates a Famous Experiment to
  Understand How Ordinary People Can Perform
  Unthinkable Acts
• Most of us have struggled to understand how
  seemingly ordinary people can sometimes do
  morally questionable things.
• Do you have to be an evil person to do evil
  things?

6
Primetime Basic Instincts Video The Science of
EvilOn a separate sheet of paper, do the
following

• Take Notes to compare contrast the 1960s
  experiment with the new experiment
• What were the findings of the new experiment?
• List explain two examples from history and
  current events where the accused people have
  defended themselves with I was just doing my
  job.

7
Objectives/ Outcomes

• Discuss the need for conformity in a society
  within the context of the problems that can arise
  with following norms blindly.
• Identify and explain the relationship between
  norms and laws in society and the societys
  values.
• Observe conditions in controlled environments and
  explain the relationship between training and the
  following of norms in a given society.
• Compare and contrast theories of crowd behavior

8
Milgrams Obedience Experiment

• Early 1960s
• Yale social psychologist
• Dr. Stanley Milgram
• Experiment
• Obedience to Authority vs. Personal Conscience

9
Experiment Question

• Can a group cause a person to physically punish a
  victim with severity despite the victims pleas
  for mercy?
• Milgrams research answered yes to this
  question.
• Peer Pressure can cause people to treat others in
  ways they otherwise would not!

10
Experiment Design

• Research teams
• Experimenter and learner are in on the
  experiment
• Teachers are not

• Teacher is instructed to shock the learner each
  time the learner gets an answer incorrect
• Learner is an actor who is told to get all
  answers wrong

11
Experiment Design

• Generator has 30 switches in 15 volt increments
  labeled from 15 volts to 405 volts
• Also labeled ranging from slight shock to
  danger severe shock

12
Experiment Design

• As the learner answered the questions
  incorrectly, the teacher was encouraged to
  increase the power of the shock.
• Even as learners protested, the teacher, under
  the direction of the experimenter, increased the
  shocks.
• The learners did not really feel the shocks. They
  were acting but the teachers did not know it.

13
Experiment Design

• As shocks became stronger, the learner grunted,
  protested, and finally demanded that the
  experiment stop.
• Learner also shouted I cant stand the pain!
• The teachers asked the experimenters if they
  should continue and when told yes, they did
  continue with the shocks!

14
Experiment Results

• 65 of the teachers punished the learners to the
  maximum 420 volts.
• No teacher stopped before reaching 300 volts!
• People, just like you and me, shocked others
  because they were following orders and obeying
  an authority figure.

15
Experiment Results

• Milgram set up a control group in which there was
  not an experimenter in the room with the teacher.
• Shock voltage was much lower in this control
  group.
• Thus group pressure heavily influenced the level
  of shock administration in the experiment.

16
Shock Generator
17
Graph illustrating levels of shock voltage

• What conclusion can we draw from this graph?

18
Implications

• We did not need Milgram to tell us that we have a
  tendency to obey orders.
• But what we did not know before Milgram's
  experiments was just how powerful this tendency
  is.
• And having been enlightened about our extreme
  readiness to obey authorities, we can try to take
  steps to guard against unwelcome or reprehensible
  commands.

19
Implications

• Many professions have taken heed of Milgram's
  work.
• The US army, for example, now incorporates his
  findings into its education of officers in order
  to illuminate the issue of following unethical
  orders.
• However, it is not clear that medicine has truly
  understood the implications of Milgram's work.
• How often are doctors or medical students in the
  position of having to obey "orders" or implicit
  expectations in hospitals or clinics, when they
  are uneasy about the ethics of doing so?

20
Was it ethical?

• Teacher subjects were encouraged to hurt others
  even when they expressed concern about it
• How did it affect them to hear the screams and
  pleas of the learners and to think that they were
  real?

21
How does this fit into Roles/Status?
22
How do groups influence our behavior?

• Have you ever been egged on by the crowd?
• Or done anything just because everyone else did?
• Have you ever done something that you normally
  would not because you were following orders?