Infographic 15.2: Milgram's Obedience Study

There are three sections in the infographic. Text under the title reads “Stanley Milgram’s study on obedience and authority was one of the most ground-breaking and surprising experiments in all of social psychology. Milgram wanted to test the extent to which we will follow the orders of an authority figure. Would we follow orders to hurt someone else, even when that person was begging us to stop? Milgram’s experiment also raises ethical issues about deception and informed consent. Participants had to actually think they were shocking another person for the experiment to work. Creating this deception involved the use of confederates (people secretly working for the researchers) whose behaviors and spoken responses were carefully scripted. Milgram found high levels of obedience in his participants—much higher than he and others had predicted at the beginning of the study.” Section one is an illustration of the experiment, shown as an overhead view. In one room, the “Teacher” (participant) sits at a table with a shock generator. Behind the “teacher”, the “Experimenter” (confederate) sits at another table, writing in a notepad. The experimenter says phrases like “Please continue” and “The experiment requires you to go on.” In a room immediately adjacent to the first, the “learner” (confederate) sits at their own table, attached by wires that seem to connect to the shock generator in the first room. Beside this illustration is a photograph of a “teacher” administrating the fake shocks in the test. Text attached to section 1 reads ‘The “teacher” who operated the shock generator in Milgram’s experiment was the only actual participant. The experiment involved two confederates: a “learner” who pretended to suffer shocks administered by the participant, and an “experimenter” who prompted the participant to continue (Milgram, 1965).’ Section 2 is an illustration of the control panel of the shock generator. The shock generator has 30 voltage settings, and eight labeled sections for eight levels of voltage. 15 volts is labeled “Slight shock”, 75 volts is labeled “Moderate shock”, 135 volts is labeled “strong shock”, 195 volts is labeled “Very strong shock”, 255 volts is labeled “intense shock”, 315 volts is labeled “Extreme intensity shock”, 375 volts is labeled “Danger: severe shock”, and 435 to 450 volts is labeled “XXX”. At level 10, approximately 140 volts, the Learner says “Experimenter, get me out of here! I refuse to go on!” At level 12, approximately 180 volts, the learner says “I can’t stand the pain!” At level 14, approximately 200 volts, the learner says “(grunt) I’ve had enough!” At level 20, approximately 300 volts, the learner says “(scream) “I absolutely refuse to answer any more! Get me out of here!” Text attached to the illustration in section 2 reads “On the control panel of Milgram’s shock generator, the participant would see 30 switches clearly labeled as delivering a range from “Slight shock” (15 volts) to “Danger: Severe shock” (375 volts) and beyond. The “learner” produced scripted responses at every level (Milgram, 1963).” Section 3 shows a data chart, with “Percentage of participants still obedient” on the y axis and shock level in volts on the x axis. Y values range from 0 to 100, and x values range from 15 to 450 volts. There are two data lines on the chart, one for predicted behavior and one for actual behavior. The predicted behavior had participants steadily becoming less obedient as the shock levels went higher, dropping from 100 percent at 15 volts to almost 0 percent at 315 volts. The actual behavior had three plateaus, 100 percent obedience from 15 to 35, then dropping to 80 percent from 180 to 300, then dropping to 60 percent from 330 to 450 volts. Text attached to the chart reads “Before the experiment, Milgram and a panel of experts predicted most participants would not proceed beyond 150 volts, when the “learner” explicitly demands to end the experiment. In fact, actual results show that most participants obeyed the experimenter’s commands all the way to the highest shock level.”