Abstract
Milgram's famous experiment contained 23 small-sample conditions that elicited striking variations in obedient responding. A synthesis of these diverse conditions could clarify the factors that influence obedience in the Milgram paradigm. We assembled data from the 21 conditions (N = 740) in which obedience involved progression to maximum voltage (overall rate 43.6%) and coded these conditions on 14 properties pertaining to the learner, the teacher, the experimenter, the learner-teacher relation, the experimenter-teacher relation, and the experimental setting. Logistic regression analysis indicated that eight factors influenced the likelihood that teachers continued to the 450 volt shock: the experimenter's directiveness, legitimacy, and consistency; group pressure on the teacher to disobey; the indirectness, proximity, and intimacy of the relation between teacher and learner; and the distance between the teacher and the experimenter. Implications are discussed.
Highlights
The Milgram study is arguably the most iconic experiment in the history of psychology
The aim of our study was to determine which of the many potential influences were statistically reliable, rather than to test a particular theory of obedience or interpretation of the Milgram study
Obedience rates were higher for more vulnerable learners (p = .011), for female teachers (p = .005), and for more indirect teacher-learner relations (p,.001)
Summary
The Milgram study is arguably the most iconic experiment in the history of psychology. Scholars continue to discuss whether Milgram demonstrated the capacity for evil in everyday people, the roots of the Holocaust, or the ethical limitations of psychological research. Arguments continue on the nature of authority and the meaning of obedience within Milgram’s paradigm [1] and how the study’s findings should be theorized [2]. Attempts have been made to replicate it with mixed results [3,4] and the original data have been reexamined [5]. Archival scholarship continues to examine the origins of Milgram’s work [6] and to unearth troubling discrepancies between its public representation and how its methodology was executed in practice [7]
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