Psychology class.Group Pressure And Action Against A Person Milgram - Essay Example

INSERT HERE INSERT HERE INSERT HERE May 24, Milgram’s Conformity Study According to Huffman, conformity can be defined as “INSERT YOUR TEXTBOOK’S DEFINITION FOR CONFORMITY HERE” ( INSERT PAGE NUMBER). Conformity serves many functions, both positive and negative, in the social life of an individual (Huffman INSERT PAGE NUMBER) and thus has been studied extensively. One of the most famous studies on conformity was conducted by Stanley Milgram in 1965. Like most topics in the social sciences, conformity is not an easy subject to research scientifically.

In order to do so, Milgram designed a brilliant experiment that paired research subjects with experimenter cohorts in order to study the effects of authority on obedience. In this study, the research subjects were asked to test learners and administer them shocks with increasing degrees of intensity when the learners provided an incorrect answer. This was to be done in the presence of an authority figure, who asked the tester to continue administering shocks even when the learners began to protest, sometimes intensely.

The learners, who were not actually subjected to shocks, and the authority figures were cohorts of the experimenter, while the young men administering the shocks were unaware of the true purpose of the experiment. This experiment was done in multiple forms. When the authority figure and no others were present, the research subjects often administered high levels of shock. When no authority figure was present, the research subjects were significantly less likely to administer high levels of shock.

This experiment was also conducted with a group design, meaning that in some cases the research subject was placed in a room with the authority figure and two other “research subjects” who were actually cohorts of the experimenter. The other “research subjects” would stand up to the authority figure and end their testing session at predetermined intervals, making the actual research subject significantly more likely to refuse to administer the highest levels of shock than when other “research subjects” were not present (Milgram, 127-134).

As is demonstrated by Milgram’s experiment, conformity often occurs even when an individual may not personally feel comfortable with what he or she is being asked to conform to (Huffman INSERT PAGE NUMBER), especially in situations where an authority figure is present. While Milgram’s experiment raised several important ethical questions and concerns, it remains one of the most important research undertakings in the history of conformity research (Shuttleworth). Works Cited Huffman, Karen.

Psychology in Action. 9th ed. INSERT CITY OF PUBLICATION: INSERT PUBLISHER, INSERT YEAR OF PUBLICATION. Print. Milgram, Stanley. “Liberating Effects of Group Pressure”. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1965: 127-134. Print. Shuttleworth, Martyn. “Milgram Experiment Ethics”. Experimental Resources.com. 2008. Web. 23 May 2011.