On Tue, 19 May 2009 10:20:03 -0700, Michael Sylvester wrote: > >This may sound like damn if you do and damn if you don't. But wouldn't >I have to use all male subjects if I was to do an exact replicate of the >Milgram study? Is there an issue as criteria change?
It depends upon which Milgram "study" you're referring to. Note that the original Milgram "experiment" has only one experimental condition meaning that the "independent variable" has only one level (it's a constant). In his book "Obedience to Authority" (small parts of which are available at books.google.com), many different conditions are identified. To appreciate what makes up the "obedience to authority experiment", consider the following excerpt from the Wikipedia entry (standard disclaimers apply): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment |Milgram's variations | |In Obedience to Authority: An Experimental View, Milgram describes |19 variations of his experiment. Generally, when the victim's physical |immediacy was increased, the participant's compliance decreased. |The participant's compliance also decreased when the authority's |physical immediacy decreased (Experiments 1–4). For example, in |Experiment 2, where participants received telephonic instructions |from the experimenter, compliance decreased to 21 percent. |Interestingly, some participants deceived the experimenter by |pretending to continue the experiment. In the variation where the |"learner's" physical immediacy was closest, where participants had |to physically hold the "learner's" arm onto a shock plate, compliance |decreased. Under that condition, 30 percent of participants completed |the experiment. | |In Experiment 8, women were the participants; previously, all participants |had been men. Obedience did not significantly differ, though the women |communicated experiencing higher levels of stress. | |Experiment 10 took place in a modest office in Bridgeport, Connecticut, |purporting to be the commercial entity "Research Associates of Bridgeport" |without apparent connection to Yale University, to eliminate the university's |prestige as a factor influencing the participants' behavior. In those conditions, |obedience dropped to 47.5 percent. | |Milgram also combined the power of authority with that of conformity. In |those experiments, the participant was joined by one or two additional |"teachers" (also actors, like the "learner"). The behavior of the participants' |peers strongly affected the results. In Experiment 17, when two additional |teachers refused to comply, only 4 of 40 participants continued in the |experiment. In Experiment 18, the participant performed a subsidiary task |(reading the questions via microphone or recording the learner's answers) |with another "teacher" who complied fully. In that variation, 37 of 40 |continued with the experiment.[18] There is additional info as well as more information on recent replications. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
