Stanley Milgram Father of the Obedience Experiment By Megan Goodney
Childhood and Family Life Parents were Samuel and Adele Jewish Immigrants Older sister Marjorie Younger brother Joel
Childhood and Family Life Stanley was born August 15, 1933 Began to display his intelligence in kindergarten Got his high school degree in 3 years Highest IQ in his class; 158
College Life Attended Queens College Majored in Political Science Spent a summer touring Europe Got his B.A. in 1954
College Life Started attending Harvard’s Department of Social Relations Was initially rejected from the department Was mentored by Gordon Allport Was a research assistant to Solomon Asch
College Life For his dissertation, Milgram did a cross cultural experiment based on Asch’s work Spent 2 years in Europe collecting his data After his dissertation was complete, he got a job at Yale University
Adult Life Started as an assistant professor with an annual salary of $6,500 Submitted proposals to the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Mental Health, and the Office of Naval Research. Got approval for his proposal from the National Institute of Mental Health Started his obedience experiment
Obedience Experiment
Obedience Experiment “Teachers” were asked to administer increasingly severe electric shocks to the "learner" when questions were answered incorrectly If at any point the “teacher” hesitated to inflict the shocks, the experimenter would request him to proceed with statements, such as "The experiment requires that you continue”
Obedience Experiment Those who questioned authority were in the minority. 65% of the “teachers” were willing to progress to the maximum voltage level In general, more "teachers" obeyed when (1) the authority figure was in close proximity; (2) teachers felt they could pass on responsibility to others; and (3) experiments took place under the sponsorship of a respected organization.
Obedience Experiment Obeyed but justified themselves . Subjects that were obedient participants gave up responsibility for their actions, blaming the experimenter Obeyed but blamed themselves . Subjects that felt badly about what they had done and were quite harsh on themselves Rebelled . Subjects who questioned the authority of the experimenter and argued there was a greater ethical dilemma calling for the protection of the learner over the needs of the experimenter
Obedience Experiment “A substantial proportion of people do what they are told to do, irrespective of the content of the act, and without pangs of conscious so long as they perceive that the command comes from a legitimate authority. This is, perhaps, the most fundamental lesson of our study: ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process.” – Stanley Milgram
Adult Life Met his future wife, Alexandra Menkin, during the year of his obedience experiment She was a child of Jewish European immigrants Were married on December 10, 1961
Lost-Letter Technique In the summer of 1963, Milgram was hired by Harvard to return to the Department of Social Relations, again as an assistant professor on a three-year contract He and his students developed the lost-letter technique It is based on the belief that if you came across an unmailed letter lying on the sidewalk, the right thing to do would be to find a mailbox and drop it in
Lost-Letter Technique They dropped the letters in four different settings: in phone booths, on sidewalks, inside stores, and under windshield wipers with a note saying, “found near car” They had each of the letters addressed to one of four recipients, with 100 letters going to each recipient: Friends of the Communist Party, Friends of the Nazi Party, Medical Research Associates, and a private individual Mr. Walter Carnap
Adult Life During this time, he and Sasha had their first child Michelle in 1964 Three years later, they had their second child, Marc Milgram was a dedicated father, spending much time playing games, taking trips, and talking with his children
Adult Life His contract with Harvard was extended in 1966 for one year as a lecturer, but he was not accepted for tenure at the end of the year City University of New York (CUNY), with its recently formed graduate program, offered him not only an entry into a full professorship, but also asked him to head the social psychology program for its Graduate Center
Small World Experiment Beginning in 1967, Milgram carried out a series of experiments, known as the "small world experiment," examining the average path length for social networks of people in the United States Milgram's work developed out of a desire to learn more about the probability that two randomly selected people would know each other. Milgram's experiment was designed to measure these path lengths by developing a procedure to count the number of ties between any two people
Small World Experiment Information packets were initially sent to randomly selected individuals in Omaha or Wichita. They included letters, which detailed the study's purpose, and basic information about a target contact person in Boston When and if the package eventually reached the contact person in Boston, the researchers could examine the roster to count the number of times it had been forwarded from person to person
Adult Life Published Obedience to Authority in 1974 The time Milgram used to write his Obedience to Authority was actually during a fellowship which took him, with his family, to Paris for one of his studies of mental maps Mental maps are mental representations of the layout of one's environment
Adult Life He also made a number of films; some based on his own work, others about social psychology in general Milgram gave around 140 talks; most were on topics other than obedience He made his own film about the obedience experiments
Adult Life He also conducted a number of experiments on the urban life He worked with Harry From to produce the movie, The City and the Self in 1972. This movie was about Milgram’s “The Experience of Living in Cities,” which was an article about the differences in behavior brought about by urban environments
Achievements Milgram’s work appeared in a number of journals, including the Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, Sociometry, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , and Psychology Today . CUNY named him as Distinguished Professor of Psychology in 1980. In 1983, he was selected to be a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Discussion Questions Why do you think individuals follow the instructions of authority, even if they are technically able to disobey? Do you think Milgram’s study is time-bound (limited to the early 1960’s when his studies were conducted)? Do you feel like the obedience experiment was ethical?
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