The Fundamental Attribution Error : The Milgram Obedience Study Performed By Stanley Milgram

In the early 1960s, Stanley Milgram, a social psychologist at Yale, conducted a series of experiments that became famous. Unsuspecting Americans were recruited for what purportedly was an experiment in learning. A man who pretended to be a recruit himself was wired up to a phony machine that supposedly administered shocks. He was the "learner." In some versions of the experiment he was in an adjoining room. The unsuspecting subject of the experiment, the "teacher," read lists of words that tested the learner's memory. Each time the learner got one wrong, which he intentionally did, the teacher was instructed by a man in a white lab coat to deliver a shock. With each wrong answer the voltage went up. From the other room came recorded and convincing protests from the learner — even though no shock was actually being administered.

In "The Perils of Obedience," Stanley Milgram conducted a study that tests the conflict between obedience to authority and one's own conscience. Through the experiments, Milgram discovered that the majority of people would go against their own decisions of right and wrong to appease the requests of an authority figure.

Notably, the fundamental attribution error is a personal bias that is problematic in society. To emphasize, the fundamental attribution error is when individuals have the tendency to attribute people’s behavior to components of their character or personality, even when situational influences are producing the behavior (Textbook, page 171). An example of the fundamental attribution error operating in daily life is when a driver avoids hitting a pedestrian and causes an accident. In this

The complexities of a human’s willingness to submit to another person’s will have intrigued mankind since the formation of societal groups. Only in recent history has there been any studies conducted which so completely capture the layman’s imagination as the obedience experiments conducted by Stanley Milgram. As one of the few psychological experiments to have such an attention grabbing significance, Milgram discovered a hidden trait of the human psyche that seemed to show a hidden psychotic in even the most demure person. Milgram presents his startling findings in “The Perils of Obedience”. Publication created a great deal of discussion, with one of the more vocal critics being Diana Baumrind, who details her points of contention in the

In her article, “Review of Stanley Milgram’s Experiments on Obedience”, psychologist Diana Baumrind criticizes Stanley Milgram’s experiments on obedience to authority, stating that not only were Milgram’s experiments unethical but so was the scientist himself, claiming that he did not take appropriate measures to properly ensure his subject’s wellbeing post-experiment and therefore, experiments such as these should not be repeated. Baumrind does address an important point in her review and that is the responsibility of psychologists to ensure that their subjects are treated fairly and ethically but this is overshadowed by the fact that Baumrind’s argument is one rooted in pathos with little evidence to support her claims while being

In Stanley Milgram’s article “The Perils of Obedience,” several people volunteer to participate in Milgram’s experiment. It consists of a learner and a teacher. When the learner fails to memorize a word pair, the teacher applies a shock to the learner. The shocks increase in severity with each wrong answer, attaining a maximum voltage of 450 volts. Milgram states many psychiatrists he interviewed before the experiment predicted most subjects would not go past 150 volts, or the point at which the learner starts to ask to leave (Milgram 80). In his first experiment, twenty-five out of forty subjects continued the experiment until the end (Milgram 80). After several more experiments at different locations, Milgram obtained the same results. Milgram

Chapter 2- Obscura Obscura talks about Stanley Milgram and his experiments on obedience to authority. The purpose of this experiment was to study how far people would go in obeying an instruction if it involved harming another person. He was interested in how ordinary people could be easily influenced into committing atrocities, like the Germans in World War II. Milligram selected subjects for his experiments through newspaper advertising for male participants to take part in his study. At the beginning of the experiment the subjects were introduce to another participant, who was actually a part of Milgram’s team.

“Don’t eat that, Steve!” yells a worried mother from across the park. Her son, Steve, about to put a chunk of dirt into his mouth looks up at her, confused. “That’s dirt, son, we don’t eat that”, says his mother in a gentle and reassuring voice. Promptly, the boy obeys her, leaving the dirt on the ground and running to her arms. Babies like Steve know that, because their mom says so, they should or shouldn’t do certain things. This early form of obedience is present in human beings from a very early age. This is represented in babies obeying simple commands or prohibitions from their mother (Stayton, Hogan, & Mary D. 1971). This was found to be connected to the mother’s responses to the baby’s actions, such as her tone and her

The trait of obedience lies at the heart of the modern world; delegation the norm across the nation, across the world. Today, jobs are wheels on a cog and everyone seems to report to someone else higher-up. A scientific experiment (lauded by some, abhorred by others) performed by Stanley Milgram in the year 1963 seemed to indicate that obedience could effect evil results. Psychologist Diana Baumrind of the University of California despises the experiment, and in her critique of Milgram's work, the "Review of Stanley Milgram's Experiments on Obedience," calls it unethical and a violation of the sacred trust between experimenter and subject (Baumrind 90). She also criticizes Milgram's comparison of Adolf Eichmann as similar to the subjects in

The Milgram Obedience Experiment was misleading but definitely had a purpose that gave sociologist more understanding to human obedience. The research was a deviant situation, which is ?a violation of social norm? 1,

Does everybody have the ability to do evil, or are we all naturally innocent and good? William Golding believed that we were all born with the ability to do evil. Jean-Jacques Rousseau had a different view: he believed that at all of us are naturally innocent and it is our environment that leads us to do evil. Although Rousseau’s idea is true in some instances, Golding is right: It is human instinct to do what seems best for us, even if it means doing evil.

When individuals abandon their own freedom for the benefit of the larger group, they are no longer individuals but products of conformity. Obedience to authority can become dangerous when morals and independent thought are stifled to the point that harm is inflicted upon another person. "The Perils of Obedience" by Stanley Milgram reports on his controversial experiment that test how far individuals would go in obeying orders, even if carrying out those orders caused serious harm to others. This experiment caused a lot of controversy and one woman in particular believed that this experiment was immoral. Diana Baumrind's "Review of Stanley Milgram's Experiments on Obedience" says that Milgram

The "Perils of Obedience" by Stanley Milgram details about the classic studies relating to obedience. The main study in focus is the Milgram’s Obedience study, conducted in the 1963 by the Yale University scientist Stanley Milgram. The experiment was designed by Milgram in such a way that participants are forced to obey the instructions of authority figure, even if they are immoral and also when such instructions cause pain/harm to another person. The participants selected for the experiment are ordinary people (Milgram, 630). The participants were willing to administer electric shocks to remaining people when ordered by authority figure. The Milgram experiment does not address the ethical concerns of testing and Jerry Burger of Santa Clara University, upon modifying the Milgram's setup found that situational factors result increased obedience in participants (Milgram, 631). The studies conducted by Burger and Milgram showed under a specific set of circumstances, the

Evaluation of Milgram's Obedience Study Stanley Milgram was from a Jewish background and conducted the experiment to see how people can obey to an apparent authority figure e.g. Germans in World War II. He advertised for participants in a newspaper offering payment of $4.50. Volunteers were told that the experiment was looking at the effects of punishment on learning. The participant played the role of the ‘teacher’ and the ‘learner’ was a stooge, Mr Wallace.

“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum....”