Milgram Obedience Study

NARRATOR: In a unique period from the early '60s to the early '70s,

a group of social scientists conducted a series of experiments,

examining the nature of human behavior and

its relationship to social conventions and situations.

PATIENT SEATED IN DENTAL CHAIR: In this setting, I allow things to be done to

me that I wouldn't allow in any other context.

The dentist is about to put an electric drill into my mouth.

MAN SEATED IN BARBER SHOP: In this setting, I willingly expose my throat to a man with a razor blade.

NARRATOR: Stanley Milgram, one of the most influential social psychologists of the time,

was particularly fascinated with the dangers of

group behavior and blind obedience to authority.

STANLEY MILGRAM: What is there in human nature that allows

an individual to act without any restraints whatsoever,

so that he can act inhumanely, harshly,

severely, and in no way limited by feelings of compassion or conscience?

These are questions [INAUDIBLE]. MAN PARTAKING IN EXPERIMENT: But he might be dead in there. EXPERIMENTER: The experiment requires that you continue, please.

MAN PARTAKING IN EXPERIMENT: Three hundred and thirty volts.

NARRATOR: The experiments that Milgram and others conducted were

controversial and for ethical reasons may never be conducted again.

Yet the results of those experiments remain groundbreaking,

profoundly revealing about the tensions between the individual and

society and increasingly relevant to contemporary life.

In 1962, Stanley Milgram shocked the world with his study on obedience.

To test his theories,

he invented a new [INAUDIBLE] that would become a window into human cruelty.

In ascending order, a row of buttons marked

the amount of voltage one person would inflict upon another.

Milgram's original motive for the experiment was to understand the unthinkable—

how the German people could permit the extermination of the Jews.

STANLEY INGRAM: When I learn of incidents such as the massacre of millions of men,

women, and children perpetrated by the Nazis in World War II,

how is it possible, I ask myself, that

ordinary people who are courteous and decent in everyday life,

can act callously, inhumanely,

without any limitations of conscience?

Now there are some studies in my discipline,

social psychology that seem to provide a clue to this question.

The problem I wanted to study was a little different.

It went a little bit further. It was the issue of authority.

Under what conditions would a person obey

authority who commanded actions that went against conscience?

These are exactly the questions that I wanted to investigate at Yale University.

PRESENTER: It is May 1962,

an experiment is being conducted in

the Elegant Interaction Laboratory at Yale University.

The subjects are 40 males

between the ages of 20 and 50 residing in the Greater New Haven area.

EXPERIMENTER: Psychologists have developed several theories to explain how people learn.

One theory is that people learn things

correctly whenever they get punished for making a mistake.

NARRATOR: Forty years later, Milgram's infamous experiment, "Obedience",

is still taught in classrooms around the world.

EXPERIMENTER: Would you open those and tell me which of you is which, please?

TEACHER: Teacher. LEARNER: Learner.

EXPERIMENTER: Now the next thing we'll have to do is set

the learner up so that he can get some sort of punishment.

DR. THOMAS BLASS: What inspired Milgram,

I would say there were a number of factors.

One of them is he was very ambitious.

He wanted to make a mark in social psychology,

and as he wrote to one friend,

he wanted to come up with the boldest experiment that he could think of.

EXPERIMENTER: Would you roll up your right sleeve, please?

This electrode is connected to the shock generator in the next room.

This electrode paste is to provide a good contact to avoid any blister or burn.

Do you have any questions now before we go into the next room?

LEARNER: About two years ago, I was in the Veterans Hospital in West Haven.

While there, they detected a heart condition.

Nothing serious, but as long as I'm having these shocks,

how strong are they? How dangerous are they?

EXPERIMENTER: Well, no, although they may be painful,

they're not dangerous. Anything else?

LEARNER: No, that's all.

EXPERIMENTER: Teacher, would you take the test and be seated in

front of the shock generator, please, in the next room?

NARRATOR: But the experiment was rigged.

PRESENTER: The victim was an accomplice of the experiment.

The victim, according to plan,

provided many wrong answers.

His verbal responses were standardized on tape,

and each protest was coordinated to a particular voltage level on the shock generator.

STANLEY MILGRAM: Now, as teacher, you are seated in front of

this impressive-looking instrument—the shock generator.

Its essential feature is a line of switches that goes from 15 volts to 450 volts

and a set of verbal designations that goes from slight shock to moderate shock, strong shock,

very strong shock, intense shock,

extreme intensity shock and finally,

XXX danger severe shock.

Your job, the experimenter explains to you,

is the word pair test.

If he gets each answer correctly,

fine, you move on to the next pair.

But if he makes a mistake,

you were instructed to give an electric shock,

starting with 15 volts.

You increase the shock one step on each error.

TEACHER: Incorrect. You'll now get a shock of 105.

Hard hit. Just how far can you go on this thing?

EXPERIMENTER: As far as it's necessary.

TEACHER: What do you mean "as far as is necessary"?

DR. THOMAS BLASS: Milgram was very much aware that

obedience is a necessary ingredient for society to function.

But he focused on the darker side of obedience.

TEACHER: Incorrect, 150 volts. Sad faced.

LEARNER: That's all. Get me out of here.

I told you I have heart trouble,

my heart's starting to bother me now.

EXPERIMENTER: It's absolutely essential that you continue.

You have no other choice, teacher.

TEACHER: Oh, I have a lot of choices.

My number one choice is that I wouldn't go on if I thought he was being harmed.

STANLEY MILGRAM: Now, this man makes disobedience seem a very rational and simple deed.

Now other subjects respond quite differently to the experimenter's authority.

TEACHER: Wrong. It's hair. 75 volts. [LAUGHTER]

EXPERIMENTER: Please continue.

DR THOMAS BLASS: Some psychologists were troubled by the ethics of it.

Many, if not most subjects found it a highly stressful, conflicted experience.

People are stammering, stuttering, laughing hysterically, inappropriately.

TEACHER: One hundred and fifty volts.

LEARNER: [SHOUT OF PAIN] Experimenter, that's all.

Get me out of here.

I told you I have heart trouble, my heart's starting to bother me now.

Get me out of here, please. Let me out of here.

You have no right to keep me here.

Let me out. Let me out of here. Let me out. Let me out of here. EXPERIMENTER: Continue, please. Go on. [SHOUTING]

DR. THOMAS BLASS: Clearly when we say people went to the top of the shock board,

it wasn't like they were going blindly, sadistically.

People went, stop and go, stop and go.

They were in a state of conflict,

which created a tremendous amount of stress.

That was the main critique.

TEACHER: This will be at 330. [SCREAM] [NOISE]

HERBERT WINER: As his voice began to show increasing frustration,

so did I. I was really in a state of real conflict and agitation.

One of Stanley Milgram's basic contributions

was that you don't ask people what they would do,

given this hypothetical situation,

you put them in the situation.

TEACHER: Wrong, that's 180 volts.

EXPERIMENTER: Please continue teacher.

TEACHER: A hundred and eighty volts.

LEARNER: Oh, I can't stand the pain. Get me out of here.

TEACHER: I can't stand it. I'm not going to kill that man.

DR. THOMAS BLASS: According to Milgram,

one of the things that's a prerequisite for carrying out acts that are evil

is to shed responsibility from your shoulders and hand it over to the person in charge.

TEACHER: Who's going to take responsibility if anything happens to that gentleman?

EXPERIMENTER: I'm responsible for anything that happens here. Continue, please.

TEACHER: Alright next one, slow.

DR THOMAS BLASS: They didn't hold any gun to anybody's head.

Just the fact that he conveyed a sense of authority.

Roughly 60, 65% of the people went all the way to the top of the shock board.

TEACHER: Four hundred and fifty volts. That's it.

EXPERIMENTER: Now, continue using the last switch on the board,

please, the 450 switch for each wrong answer. Continue, please.

TEACHER: I'm not getting no answer.

Don't the man's health mean anything?

EXPERIMENTER: Whether the learner likes it or not...

TEACHER: He might be dead in there.

HERBERT WINER: Milgram made the point,

I think, very effectively,

that the Nazis were all a bunch of psychopaths at Delson and

Dachau, a death camp from the middle class in New Haven.

ANOTHER EXPERIMENTER: Well, who was actually pushing the switch?

TEACHER: I was. But he kept insisting.

I told him no, but he said you got to keep going.

DR. THOMAS BLASS: What kind of obedience would Milgram get today if he were to do the experiment today?

FEMALE STUDENT: Probably about the same.

DR. THOMAS BLASS: Probably about the same. Why?

FEMALE STUDENT 1: I don't know. I think people are just inherently obedient.

FEMALE STUDENT 2: It just really shows how far human beings will

go to appease what they perceive to be a authority figure.

DR. THOMAS BLASS: Milgram has identified one of the constants,

one of the universals of social behavior.

The readiness to obey authority cuts across time. It's a constant.

The other outstanding and distinctive thing about the obedience experiment is how

much it has and keeps on permeating contemporary culture and thought.

It's still with us in very important way.