Critical Appraisal on Obedience

8/20/2019 Critical Appraisal on Obedience

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Provide a critical appraisal of Milgram’s work on obedience. Support your answer with reference to

conceptual/theoretical and empirical evidence.

The obedience test by Stanford Milgram is considered one of the most famous, but

controversial experiments that occurred in the 1960s. Milgram was interested in whether

ordinary people could be gently coerced into committing wrongdoing (see Hogg & Vaughan,

2014 (p242-243)) for a summary of the experiment). The results were remarkable, and

Milgram’s experiment soon became the forefront of scrutiny. Milgram’s work on obedience

not only shaped how we construct experiments today, but also shaped our understanding on

the role of authority. This essay aims to critically appraise Milgram’s obedience study by

examining ethics, reliability and validity, heuristics and finally, the impact on society ( using

the military as an example).

Whilst Milgram’s experiment crossed ethical boundaries in then and todays psychological

field, it has ultimately proven itself beneficial. Firstly, Milgram’s study was placed under

scrutiny upon his works being released to the public by the APA for investigating the role of

harm in the experiment. As the participant communicated through an intercom, the

participant was subjected to screaming, refusal to continue, and then silence inducing high

levels of stress and agitation. Milgram defended his position stating that “the experiment was

not designed to induce stress, and it was initially unexpected” (Milgram, 1992); however,

Milgram continued the experiment rather than terminate it, on the basis that each participant

prior recovered well after the session and the results were so ‘ground breaking’ and

‘insightful’ (Youngpeter, 2008). Furthermore, participants were also given a reconciliation

session during the debrief, along with follow up therapy sessions. A year later, external

psychologists examined the participants to confirm that no internal harm was caused from the

experiment suggesting that Milgram ensured their mental health on self perception and



compassion was not compromised. Secondly, whilst the participant consented to the

experiment, they were consenting to an educational psychological experiment based on “ the

effect of punishment on memory” rather than the study of measuring obedience. It was a

form of deception (Baumrind, 1964). Despite the understandable reason that it would induce

bias and possibly demand characteristics, it still warranted attention and influenced the

creation and enhancement of the APA ethic code. For example, currently if deception is to be

used in an experiment it is only used to “maximise benefits and minimise harm” so long as it

does not “cause harm or mistrust” (American Psychological Association, 2010). Overall,

Milgram cared for the well being of the participants through follow-up and reconciliation

sessions and whilst his work was deceitful, the results were insightful. The amount of

critiques he received meant that ethics could transform into something more stable.

Although, the experiment was controversial, Milgram was heralded for his thorough and well

structured methodology resulting in a strong internal, experimental validity and reliability.

For instance, before the experiment took place, Milgram and a large panel of experts on

human behaviour (110) discussed their predictions of the experiment. Whilst they agreed the

participants would obey the experimenter, they believed the participant would stop at some

point in the experiment or at most end at 150v. (Hogg & Vaughan, 2014, p. 242); Instead

66% of the participants went all the way to 450v. Their predictions were superseded proving

an unexpected implication of their results (Milgram, 1963). Critics also believed the

experiment was not generalizable as it used 40 male participants from the united states, this

perception was altered when cross cultural studies began to take place, only confirming the

results to generally be a statistical valid response. Thus showing that externally, there was a

strong test-retest reliability as well as generalising a population (Blass, 2012). This will be

further examined in the next paragraph. Milgram was also criticised for not informing the

participant over the use of cameras. Whilst this process isn’t ethical, it does show the



ecological validity of the experiment so far as laboratory experiments go. Milgram ensured

the participant was reacting ‘naturally’ to the interchanged, repeated four but assertively calm

verbal orders of the experimenter to avoid impact of demand characteristics (Orne &

Holland, 1968). In addition by publishing the videos, meant that others could examine the

footage and comment on any changes in the participant and experimenter that Milgram had

missed. In sum, the experiment had high inter-rater reliability, high reliability (test-retest)

and ecological validity within a laboratory setting.

Milgram’s experiment is still commonly referred to, examined and scrutinized 50 years after

its first published article indicating that it clearly has heuristic value in the psychological

field. Because the topic was highly controversial, Milgram expanded upon the criticisms of

his work taking into account where the scepticism lied. Milgram then experimented both with

location setting and population demographic to improve upon his theory of obedience. These

systematic deviations meant it could be used to answer specific critiques. For instance,

Milgram felt that because the initial experiment was set up in a laboratory in a prestigious

university, participants were more likely to follow the authority of a man dressed in a white-

coated laboratory gown (Milgram, 1965). He moved it to a place downtown (Bridgetown) in

a second story office building where the experimenter dressed casually. The result decreased

from approximately 65% to 48% only confirming that authority maintained control over

obedience. Furthermore, other experimenters also wished to replicate his study to examine

the effect cross culturally. A meta-analysis, analysing the results from 9 studies culturally

show an average of 66% only supporting his findings further and when compared to the 10

American studies (61%) show the significance of just how statistically relevant his study is.

Finally, Milgram’s concept on obedience also transgressed into different focus subjects such

as personality (Bègue, Lepage, Duke, Beauvois, Corbet, & Oberlé, 2014), religion (Mehl,

2014), medical practices (Hofling, Brotzman, Dalrymple, Graves, & Chester, 1966) and even



businesses (Koker & Symington, 2014) meaning the applicability and range of his works is

varied. In summary, his initial study sparked enough curiosity to expand his works by

altering his experiment, generalising his experiment and assessing the applicability of the

experiment.

Milgram’s analysis on obedience ended with 2 grave statements: (1) people obey orders

without thinking what they’re being asked to do and (2) not thinking of the outcome of their

actions (Hogg & Vaughan, 2014). One explanation for this is that from a young age it’s

instilled in a hierarchal form for evolutionary purposes; however, its impact only became

understood in military examples from the 60s. It is known that Milgram based his theory

from examining Nazi Germans in World War two to diffuse the blame from themselves due

to “following orders” (Milgram, 1963). The Vietnamese war, in the 60s, responded

appropriately to the misconduct of its soldiers. One example is the “Calley –My lai massacre

“ trial. A public survey investigated the trial for Calley’s actions were to cover up the role of

a higher ranked officer. Approximately 65% believed he was wrongly court martialled

(American Experience, 2009; Kelman, 1989). Overall, society has become more sympathetic

to crimes committed at ‘lower ranks’ but more punishing and judgemental to those in ‘higher

ranks’.

In conclusion, Stanford Milgram was a pioneer in psychological research. Whilst his

experiment may not have gained the fame it, it remains highly relevant journal article and

beneficial to our society. His meticulous effort meant that psychology could introduce

measures to protect the general population in a reasonable way. His works inspired many to

expand upon his theory and refine it. Milgram’s work impacts society by showing just how

easy following orders can be and therefore scrutinizes those (in leadership) more harshly than

they would the follower.



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Critical Appraisal on Obedience

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