May
Milgram’s Study of Obedience and Cognitive Dissonance
Mailgram’s classic study of obedience (1964) is has been accounted for by a variety of theories. As tends to occur in psychology, a myriad of viewpoints on the structural and functional aspects of a phenomenon exits. This ambiguousness can be seen in the contending theories of cognitive dissonance and accessibility theory; conceptual explanations for human social behavior. This paper will outline Mailgram’s study aim, method and findings and critically reflect on the explanations afforded by the asaid social psychology theories. It is anticipated that this paper will aid undergraduate psychology students in practically applying and comparing theories on social beingness.
With regard to Mailgram’s experiment he had participants divided arbitrarily into two groups of “learner” (an actor) and “subject” (unaware of role). The two groups were paired and sat at tables that were divided by a screen. Between them was a box and so each person on one side of the table is not able to see the other, though the arm of the learner is connected too the box by electrical wire, and the subject controls the volts that the box emits to the learner. An experimenter instructed subjects to administer shocks to learner when questions were answered incorrectly. The learner/actor purposely got more and more questions wrong, and incrementally the subject would be advised by the experimenter to increase the voltage of administered shocks. At this point the learner/actor would pretend to scream in pain. At 450 volts – able to kill a person, the subjects continued to administer shocks. In Mailgram’s sample, 34 out of 40 subjects continued to obey instructions to shock the learner; however prior to the study the subjects had described themselves as decent and moral.
Subsequent investigations took place to understand the reason Mailgram’s sample remained obedient despite being responsible for inflicting harm of another. Attitudes of people have been pointed to as a possible explanation, in that socio-cultural and other environmental interactions lead to attitudes becoming ingrained and automatic responses that can be difficult to dissipate.
To avoid feelings of conflict, people tend to show a strong need to preserve attitudes, even to the point of rejecting evidence that their attitudes are being contradicted. Such as displayed by Mailgram’s subjects who believed themselves decent, and some even broke down whilst continuing to administer shocks.
Cognitive dissonance is one theory to explain the subjects remaining obedient. In that the process of acting differently to held onto attitudes was a way to minimize feelings of internal conflict and to provide self-justification as to why they chose to behave as they did. Thus, the degeneration of feelings of discomfort from the lack of consistency between behaviors and attitudes allowed the subjects to maintain a behavior they found abhorrent.
The theory of cognitive dissonance was first proposed in 1957 by the social psychologist Leon Festinger. He explained it as the tension within a person that develops from tow conflicting thoughts that occur simultaneously. So according to Festinger’s theory the subjects were engaging in a behavior that was inconsistent with their attitudes toward what was morally right, and their self belief. Festinger also contented that the person is likely to perceive a contraction between two cognitions (attitudes, beliefs, emotions and behaviors) produces a drive to take on new beliefs that are able to modify pre-existing beliefs and so reduce feelings of dissonance. Tarvis and Aaronson (cited in Smith, 2000) note that the subjects tendency for self-justification, as evidenced by the frequent comment “the experimenter told me to continue” was the main reason for their complicity and obedience.
Accessibility theory maintains that when attitudes and norms conflict it is accessibility that will determine what influences choices and behavioral responses. This is highly variable as whether attitudes of norms are more influential is relative to each individual’s accessibility to a particular behavior patters. As such, contextual variables such as the social situation itself and the physical environment also have an impact (Smith, 2000). Through the activation of cognitive schema, built up by previous experiences of social and environmental influences networks are created between schemas increasing the activation to some based on that experience and so making them more readily accessible. The subjects had had many years of building up a belief in themselves as good, decent and moral and this was more readily available as a self concept of value.
Social psychologists in general agree that the relationship between a person’s attitude and their actual behavior is dependent on the attitude being highly specific, and that the attitude be highly accessible. As such, accessibility represents the strength of the attitude or how quickly that attitude will come to mind when responding to an event or personal situation. Accessibility is dependant on the direct experience and rehersal of an attitude, the more quickly an attitude is accessed the more likely it will correctly predict a future behavior.
