Download psychology_primary_source_material

Primary Source Documents:
For Critical Analysis of Literature
Enclosed:
Erik Erikson: Stages of Adolescent Development Chart
Carl Jung: the Shadow
Friedrich Nietzche: the Overman
Solomon Asch: the Asch Experiment on Group Conformity
Zimbardo: Stanford Prison Experiment
Stanley Milgram: the Milgram Experiment on Obedience
Simply Psychology Articles:
1. Stereotypes
2. Social Roles
3. Self Concept
1
Erik Erikson’s Psychosocial Stages of Human Development:
Erik Erikson established many of these ideas in the period of 1950-1968, which was a significant period for the
field of psychoanalysis. In scientific studies, humans stopped being looked at as “God’s chosen species” during
the rise in Darwin’s theories (1859), and thus many psychologists began adapting Evolutionary Theory to how
humans are ‘socialized’ (how we learn to live/love/be in society as we age) into their identities. Below are two
charts referring to Erikson’s basic premise: As we age, we undergo major transformations during key moments
of our lives. Pay specific attention to the Stages, Basic Conflicts, and Existential Questions as you examine
Erikson’s ideas. While the age ranges in the “Stage” are different in both charts, they encompass similar ideas,
so pay more attention to the ‘Title’ of the stage, and not the strict age limits.
Erikson's Psychosocial Stages Summary Chart
Erikson's Stages of Psychosocial Development
Erik Erikson described development that occurs throughout the lifespan. Learn more in this chart summarizing Erikson's stages of psychosocial
development.
Stage
Basic Conflict Important
Events
Outcome
Infancy (birth
to 18 months)
Trust vs.
Mistrust
Feeding
Children develop a sense of trust when caregivers provide
reliabilty, care, and affection. A lack of this will lead to
mistrust.
Toilet
Training
Children need to develop a sense of personal control over
physical skills and a sense of independence. Success leads to
feelings of autonomy, failure results in feelings of shame
and doubt.
Exploration
Children need to begin asserting control and power over the
environment. Success in this stage leads to a sense of
purpose. Children who try to exert too much power
experience disapproval, resulting in a sense of guilt.
School Age (6 to Industry vs.
Inferiority
11 years)
School
Children need to cope with new social and academic
demands. Success leads to a sense of competence, while
failure results in feelings of inferiority.
Adolescence (12 Identity vs.
Role
to 18 years)
Confusion
Social
Relationships
Teens need to develop a sense of self and personal identity.
Success leads to an ability to stay true to yourself, while
failure leads to role confusion and a weak sense of self.
Autonomy vs.
Early
Childhood (2 to Shame and
Doubt
3 years)
Preschool (3 to
5 years)
Initiative vs.
Guilt
2
Approximate
Age
Virtues
Significant
Existential question[4]
relationship[3]
Examples[3]
Infancy
Hope
Mother
Can I trust the world?
Will
Parents
Is it okay to be me?
Purpose
Family
Feeding, abandonment
0-2 years
Early childhood
2–4 years
Preschool age
4–5 years
School age
5–12 years
Competence Neighbors, school
Toilet training, clothing
themselves
Is it okay for me to do, move, and
Exploring, using tools or
act?
making art
Can I make it in the world of
people and things?
School, sports
Adolescence
13–19 years
Fidelity
Peers, role model
Who am I? Who can I be?
Social relationships
3
Carl Jung - Psychology of the Shadow.
Hidden or unconscious aspects of oneself, both good and bad,
which the ego has either repressed or never recognized. (See also repression).
The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious
of the shadow without considerable moral effort. To become
conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. ["The Shadow,"
CW 9ii, par. 14.]
Before unconscious contents have been differentiated, the shadow is in effect the whole of the unconscious.
It is commonly personified in dreams by persons of the same sex as the dreamer.
The shadow is composed for the most part of repressed desires and uncivilized impulses, morally inferior
motives, childish fantasies and resentments, etc.--all those things about oneself one is not proud of. These
unacknowledged personal characteristics are often experienced in others through the mechanism of
projection.
Although, with insight and good will, the shadow can to some extent be assimilated into the conscious
personality, experience shows that there are certain features which offer the most obstinate resistance to
moral control and prove almost impossible to influence. These resistances are usually bound up with
projections, which are not recognized as such, and their recognition is a moral achievement beyond the
ordinary. While some traits peculiar to the shadow can be recognized without too much difficulty as one's
personal qualities, in this case both insight and good will are unavailing because the cause of the emotion
appears to lie, beyond all possibility of doubt, in the other person.[Ibid., par. 16.]
The realization of the shadow is inhibited by the persona. To the degree that we identify with a bright
persona, the shadow is correspondingly dark. Thus shadow and persona stand in a compensatory
relationship, and the conflict and characteristic depression at such times indicates the need to realize that one
is not all one pretends or wishes to be.
There is no generally effective technique for assimilating the shadow. It is more like diplomacy or
statesmanship and it is always an individual matter. First one has to accept and take seriously the existence of
the shadow. Second, one has to become aware of its qualities and intentions. This happens through
conscientious attention to moods, fantasies and impulses. Third, a long process of negotiation is
unavoidable.
It is a therapeutic necessity, indeed, the first requisite of any thorough psychological method, for
consciousness to confront its shadow. In the end this must lead to some kind of union, even though the union
consists at first in an open conflict, and often remains so for a long time. It is a struggle that cannot be
abolished by rational means. When it is wilfully repressed it continues in the unconscious and merely
expresses itself indirectly and all the more dangerously, so no advantage is gained. The struggle goes on until
the opponents run out of breath. What the outcome will be can never be seen in advance. The only certain
thing is that both parties will be changed.["Rex and Regina," CW 14, par. 514.]
4
This process of coming to terms with the Other in us is well worth while, because in this way we get to know
aspects of our nature which we would not allow anybody else to show us and which we ourselves would
never have admitted.[The Conjunction," ibid., par. 706.]
Responsibility for the shadow rests with the ego. That is why the shadow is capable of. It is quite something
else to determine what we can live out, or with. Confrontation with the shadow produces at first a dead
balance, a standstill that hampers moral decisions and makes convictions ineffective or even impossible.
Everything becomes
doubtful.[Ibid., par. 708.] The shadow is not, however, only the dark underside of the personality. It also
consists of instincts, abilities and positive moral qualities that have long been buried or never been
conscious.
The shadow is merely somewhat inferior, primitive, unadapted, and awkward; not wholly bad. It even
contains childish or primitive qualities which would in a way vitalize and embellish human existence, but convention forbids![Psychology and
Religion," CW 11, par. 134.] If it has been believed hitherto that the human shadow was the source of all
evil, it can now be ascertained on closer investigation that the unconscious man, that is, his shadow, does not
consist only of morally reprehensible tendencies, but also displays a number of good qualities, such as
normal instincts, appropriate reactions, realistic insights, creative impulses, etc.[Conclusion," CW 9ii, par.
423.] An outbreak of neurosis constellates both sides of the shadow: those qualities and activities one is not
proud of, and new possibilities one never knew were there.
Jung distinguished between the personal and the collective or archetypal shadow. With a little self-criticism
one can see through the shadow - so far as its nature is personal. But when it appears as an archetype, one
encounters the same difficulties as with anima and animus. In other words, it is quite within the bounds of
possibility for a man to recognize the relative evil of his nature, but it is a rare and shattering experience for
him to gaze into the face of absolute evil.["The Shadow," ibid., par. 19.]
5
Nietzsche’s idea of an overman and life from his point of view
Nietzsche's idea of "the overman" (Ubermensch) is one of the most significant concept in his thinking. Even
though it is mentioned very briefly only in the prologue of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, it might be sensible to
conceive that Nietzsche had something in his mind about how a man should be more than just human-all-toohuman, regardless if he was one or not.
An overman as described by Zarathustra, the main character in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, is the one who is
willing to risk all for the sake of enhancement of humanity. In contrary to the ‘last man’ whose sole desire is
his own comfort and is incapable of creating anything beyond oneself in any form. This should suggest that
an overman is someone who can establish his own values as the world in which others live their lives, often
unaware that they are not pregiven. This means an overman can affect and influence the lives of others. In
other words, an overman has his own values, independent of others, which affects and dominates others’
lives that may not have predetermined values but only herd instinct. An overman is then someone who has a
life which is not merely to live each day with no meanings when nothing in the past and future is more
important than the present, or more precisely, the pleasure and happiness in the present, but with the purpose
for humanity.
In Nietzsche’s view, an overman should be able to affect history indefinitely. He will keep reentering the
world through other people’s minds and affect their thoughts and values. Napolean, who is highly admired
by Nietzsche, may be seen as an example here since he changed and created orders in Europe. What he did
effects greatly in how Europe operates today. This idea agrees with another of his most significant idea, the
idea of the will-to-power. He asserts that life is the will-to-power. Although it is hard to say exactly what he
meant by that term, it can be described as something, which underlies how human thinks, behaves and acts in
all circumstances. He views that a human being is always in a constant struggle to quench his own
desire. This is shown in the context of power used to exclude desires of others that is in conflict to his,
power that is used to achieve what they desire. A living thing always seeks to discharge its strength, not only
to survive but to power and this sometimes results in violent behaviour which is, allegedly by Nietzshce,
intrinsic to the nature of men. However, the way to will can be different, constructive or destructive. My
interpretation would then be that an overman uses the will-to-power to influence and dominate the thoughts
of others creatively from generation to generation. In this way, his existence and power live on even after he
dies.
Nietzsche also has the answer to life that seems suffering. His answer, which is expressed in the same book
of Zarathustra, is an attitude towards life that helps one overcome the feeling of its meaninglessness. It starts
with the idea that life is an eternal recurrence with no beginning and no end but a repetition of the very same
life over and over again. With all sufferings, unhappiness and misdeeds in life, one may feel cursed and
despaired if he inevitably were to repeat the same life with the same pain and joy. However, the most
important point is that an overman should view it differently such that in the very same life, there has been a
moment that it redeems everything else. It then makes him content with and happy to repeat that very same
life again and again. He has got the feeling of unity of creation and destruction, good and bad taste of life and
is able to say that life is good even it may seem terrible and questionable. He views all the past actions, silly
or wise, accidental or achieving, as necessity of becoming himself. Therefore he can redeem himself and thus
be willing to repeat the same life again. Some may even say that ‘it was’ and ‘thus I willed it’ even though he
knows well that one cannot will backward and there are many other limitations in life. It implies that living a
life of an overman is to live with the knowledge of what has already happened and constant reinterpretation
6
according to it.’ Clearly, an overman is then someone who can, with appreciation, face life that may seem so
suffering and absurd, knowing that the basic conditions of life will not change even when he is in the ideal
state of an overman.
In a sense, overman is about self-overcoming. It involves an attitude towards life when one may feel
despaired and feel life is meaningless. It is about the way to deal with ‘truth’ not in direct manner with
straightforward rules as in rationalism, but more like a sensitive mix of trickier indirect approaches. As he
compared this with winning a woman’s heart, those who approach clumsily and directly will bound to failure
and hence left dispirited.
7
Solomon Asch - Conformity Experiment
Asch (1951) devised what is now regarded as a classic experiment in social psychology, whereby there was
an obvious answer to a line judgment task. If the participant gave an incorrect answer it would be clear that
this was due to group pressure.
Aim: Solomon Asch (1951) conducted an experiment to investigate the extent to which social pressure from
a majority group could affect a person to conform.
Procedure: Asch used a lab experiment to study conformity, whereby 50 male students from Swarthmore
College in the USA participated in a ‘vision test’. Using a line judgment task, Asch put a naive participant in
a room with seven confederates.
The confederates had agreed in advance what their responses would be when presented with the line task.
The real participant did not know this and was led to believe that the other seven participants were also real
participants like themselves.
Each person in the room had to state aloud which comparison line (A, B or C) was most like the target line.
The answer was always obvious. The real participant sat at the end of the row and gave his or her answer
last.
There were 18 trials in total and the confederates gave the wrong answer on 12 trails (called the critical
trials). Asch was interested to see if the real participant would conform to the majority view. Asch's
experiment also had a control condition where there were no confederates, only a "real participant".
Results: Asch measured the number of times each participant conformed to the majority view. On average,
about one third (32%) of the participants who were placed in this situation went along and conformed with
the clearly incorrect majority on the critical trials.
Over the 12 critical trials about 75% of participants conformed at least once and 25% of participant never
conformed. In the control group, with no pressure to conform to confederates, less than 1% of participants
gave the wrong answer.
Conclusion: Why did the participants conform so readily? When they were interviewed after the
experiment, most of them said that they did not really believe their conforming answers, but had gone along
with the group for fear of being ridiculed or thought "peculiar". A few of them said that they really did
believe the group's answers were correct.
Apparently, people conform for two main reasons: because they want to fit in with the group (normative
influence) and because they believe the group is better informed than they are (informational influence).
Evaluation: One limitation of the study is that is used a biased sample. All the participants were male
students who all belonged to the same age group. This means that study lacks population validity and that the
results cannot be generalized to females or older groups of people.
8
Another problem is that the experiment used an artificial task to measure conformity - judging line lengths.
This means that study has low ecological validity and the results cannot be generalized to other real life
situations of conformity.
Finally, there are ethical issues: participants were not protected from psychological stress which may occur if
they disagreed with the majority. Asch deceived the student volunteers claiming they were taking part in a
'vision' test; the real purpose was to see how the 'naive' participant would react to the behavior of the
confederates. However, deception was necessary to produce valid results.
The Asch (1951) study has also been called a child of its time (as conformity was the social norm in 1950’s
America). The era of individualism, ‘doing your own thing’, did not take hold until the 1960s.
Perrin and Spencer (1980) carried out an exact replication of the original Asch experiment using British
engineering, mathematics and chemistry students as participants. The results were clear cut: on only one out
of 396 trials did a participant conform with the incorrect majority. This shows the Asch experiment has poor
reliability.
9
Zimbardo - Stanford Prison Experiment
Aim: To investigate how readily people would conform to the roles of guard and prisoner in a role-playing
exercise that simulated prison life.
Zimbardo (1973) was interested in finding out whether the brutality reported among guards in American
prisons was due to the sadistic personalities of the guards or had more to do with the prison environment.
Procedure: Zimbardo used a lab experiment to study conformity.
To study the roles people play in prison situations, Zimbardo converted a basement of the Stanford
University psychology building into a mock prison. He advertised for students to play the roles of prisoners
and guards for a fortnight. 21 male college students (chosen from 75 volunteers) were screened for
psychological normality and paid $15 per day to take part in the experiment.
Participants were randomly assigned to either the role of prisoner or guard in a simulated prison
environment. The prison simulation was kept as “real life” as possible. Prisoners were arrested at their own
homes, without warning, and taken to the local police station.
Guards were also issued a khaki uniform, together with whistles, handcuffs and dark glasses, to make eye
contact with prisoners impossible. No physical violence was permitted. Zimbardo observed the behavior of
the prisoners and guards.
Here they were treated like every other criminal. They were fingerprinted, photographed and ‘booked’.
Then they were blindfolded and driven to the psychology department of Stanford University, where
Zimbardo had had the basement set out as a prison, with barred doors and windows, bare walls and small
cells. Here the deindividuation process began.
When the prisoners arrived at the prison they were stripped naked, deloused, had all their personal
possessions removed and locked away, and were given prison clothes and bedding. They were issued a
uniform, and referred to by their number only. Their clothes comprised a smock with their number written on
it, but no underclothes. They also had a tight nylon cap, and a chain around one ankle.
There were 3 guards to the 9 prisoners, taking shifts of eight hours each (the other guards remained on call)
Findings: Within a very short time both guards and prisoners were settling into their new roles, the guards
adopting theirs quickly and easily.
Within hours of beginning the experiment some guards began to harass prisoners. They behaved in a
brutal and sadistic manner, apparently enjoying it. Other guards joined in, and other prisoners were also
tormented.
The prisoners were taunted with insults and petty orders, they were given pointless and boring tasks to
accomplish, and they were generally dehumanized.
The prisoners soon adopted prisoner-like behavior too. They talked about prison issues a great deal of the
time. They ‘told tales’ on each other to the guards. They started taking the prison rules very seriously, as
though they were there for the prisoners’ benefit and infringement would spell disaster for all of them. Some
even began siding with the guards against prisoners who did not conform to the rules.
Over the next few days the relationships between the guards and the prisoners changed, with a change in one
leading to a change in the other. Remember that the guards were firmly in control and the prisoners were
totally dependent on them.
10
As the prisoners became more dependent, the guards became more derisive towards them. They held the
prisoners in contempt and let the prisoners know it. As the guards’ contempt for them grew, the prisoners
became more submissive.
As the prisoners became more submissive, the guards became more aggressive and assertive. They
demanded ever greater obedience from the prisoners. The prisoners were dependent on the guards for
everything so tried to find ways to please the guards, such as telling tales on fellow prisoners.
One prisoner had to be released after 36 hours because of uncontrollable bursts of screaming, crying
and anger. His thinking became disorganized and he appeared to be entering the early stages of a deep
depression. Within the next few days three others also had to leave after showing signs of emotional disorder
that could have had lasting consequences. (These were people who had been pronounced stable and normal a
short while before.)
Zimbardo (1973) had intended that the experiment should run for a fortnight, but on the sixth day he
closed it down. There was real danger that someone might be physically or mentally damaged if it was
allowed to run on. After some time for the researchers to gather their data the subjects were called back for a
follow-up, debriefing session.
Conclusion: People will readily conform to the social roles they are expected to play, especially if the roles
are as strongly stereotyped as those of the prison guards. The “prison” environment was an important factor
in creating the guards’ brutal behavior (none of the participants who acted as guards showed sadistic
tendencies before the study). Therefore, the roles that people play can shape their behavior and attitudes.
After the prison experiment was terminated Zimbardo interviewed the participants. Here’s an excerpt:
‘Most of the participants said they had felt involved and committed. The research had felt "real" to them.
One guard said, "I was surprised at myself. I made them call each other names and clean the toilets out with
their bare hands. I practically considered the prisoners cattle and I kept thinking I had to watch out for them
in case they tried something." Another guard said "Acting authoritatively can be fun. Power can be a great
pleasure." And another: "... during the inspection I went to Cell Two to mess up a bed which a prisoner had
just made and he grabbed me, screaming that he had just made it and that he was not going to let me mess it
up. He grabbed me by the throat and although he was laughing I was pretty scared. I lashed out with my stick
and hit him on the chin although not very hard, and when I freed myself I became angry."’
Most of the guards found it difficult to believe that they had behaved in the brutalizing ways that they had.
Many said they hadn’t known this side of them existed or that they were capable of such things. The
prisoners, too, couldn’t believe that they had responded in the submissive, cowering, dependent way they
had. Several claimed to be assertive types normally. When asked about the guards, they described the usual
three stereotypes that can be found in any prison: some guards were good, some were tough but fair, and
some were cruel.
Ethics: The study has received many ethical criticisms, including lack of fully informed consent by
participants and the level of humiliation and distress experienced by those who acted as prisoners.
The consent could not be fully informed as Zimbardo himself did not know what would happen in the
experiment (it was unpredictable). Also, participants playing the role of prisoners were not protected from
psychological and physical harm. For example, one prisoner had to be released after 36 hours because of
uncontrollable bursts of screaming, crying and anger.
11
The Milgram Experiment
by Saul McLeod published 2007
One of the most famous studies of obedience in psychology was carried out by Stanley Milgram (1963).
Stanley Milgram, a psychologist at Yale University, conducted an experiment focusing on the conflict
between obedience to authority and personal conscience.
He examined justifications for acts of genocide offered by those accused at the World War II, Nuremberg
War Criminal trials. Their defense often was based on "obedience" - that they were just following orders
from their superiors.
The experiments began in July 1961, a year after the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem. Milgram devised
the experiment to answer the question "Could it be that Eichmann and his million accomplices in the
Holocaust were just following orders? Could we call them all accomplices?" (Milgram, 1974).
Milgram (1963) wanted to investigate whether Germans were particularly obedient to authority figures as
this was a common explanation for the Nazi killings in World War II.
Milgram selected participants for his experiment by newspaper advertising for male participants to take part
in a study of learning at Yale University. The procedure was that the participant was paired with another
person and they drew lots to find out who would be the ‘learner’ and who would be the ‘teacher’. The draw
was fixed so that the participant was always the teacher, and the learner was one of Milgram’s confederates
(pretending to be a real participant).
The learner (a confederate called Mr. Wallace) was taken into a room and had electrodes attached to his
arms, and the teacher and researcher went into a room next door that contained an electric shock generator
and a row of switches marked from 15 volts (Slight Shock) to 375 volts (Danger: Severe Shock) to 450 volts
(XXX).
Milgram's Experiment
Aim:
Milgram (1963) was interested in researching how far people would go in obeying an instruction if it
involved harming another person. Stanley Milgram was interested in how easily ordinary people could be
influenced into committing atrocities for example, Germans in WWII.
Procedure:
Volunteers were recruited for a lab experiment investigating “learning” (re: ethics: deception). Participants
were 40 males, aged between 20 and 50, whose jobs ranged from unskilled to professional, from the New
Haven area. They were paid $4.50 for just turning up.
At the beginning of the experiment they were introduced to another participant, who was actually a
confederate of the experimenter (Milgram). They drew straws to determine their roles – learner or teacher –
although this was fixed and the confederate was always the learner. There was also an “experimenter”
dressed in a grey lab coat, played by an actor (not Milgram).
12
Two rooms in the Yale Interaction Laboratory were used - one for the learner (with an electric chair) and
another for the teacher and experimenter with an electric shock generator.
The “learner” (Mr. Wallace) was strapped to a chair with electrodes. After he has learned a list of word pairs
given him to learn, the "teacher" tests him by naming a word and asking the learner to recall its partner/pair
from a list of four possible choices.
The teacher is told to administer an electric shock every time the learner makes a mistake, increasing the
level of shock each time. There were 30 switches on the shock generator marked from 15 volts (slight shock)
to 450 (danger – severe shock).
The learner gave mainly wrong answers (on purpose) and for each of these the teacher gave him an electric
shock. When the teacher refused to administer a shock the experimenter was to give a series of orders / prods
to ensure they continued. There were 4 prods and if one was not obeyed then the experimenter (Mr.
Williams) read out the next prod, and so on.
Prod 1: please continue.
Prod 2: the experiment requires you to continue.
Prod 3: It is absolutely essential that you continue.
Prod 4: you have no other choice but to continue.
Results:
65% (two-thirds) of participants (i.e. teachers) continued to the highest level of 450 volts. All the participants
continued to 300 volts.
Milgram did more than one experiment – he carried out 18 variations of his study. All he did was alter the
situation (IV) to see how this affected obedience (DV).
Conclusion:
Ordinary people are likely to follow orders given by an authority figure, even to the extent of killing an
innocent human being. Obedience to authority is ingrained in us all from the way we are brought up.
People tend to obey orders from other people if they recognize their authority as morally right and / or
legally based. This response to legitimate authority is learned in a variety of situations, for example in the
family, school and workplace.
Milgram summed up in the article “The Perils of Obedience” (Milgram 1974), writing:
“The legal and philosophic aspects of obedience are of enormous import, but they say very little about how
most people behave in concrete situations. I set up a simple experiment at Yale University to test how much
pain an ordinary citizen would inflict on another person simply because he was ordered to by an
experimental scientist. Stark authority was pitted against the subjects’ [participants’] strongest moral
13
imperatives against hurting others, and, with the subjects’ [participants’] ears ringing with the screams of
the victims, authority won more often than not. The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths
on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study and the fact most urgently
demanding explanation.”
Milgrams' Agency Theory
Milgram (1974) explained the behavior of his participants by suggesting that people actually have two states
of behavior when they are in a social situation:
 The autonomous state – people direct their own actions, and they take responsibility for the results of
those actions.
The agentic state – people allow others to direct their actions, and then pass off the responsibility for
the consequences to the person giving the orders. In other words, they act as agents for another
person’s will.
Milgram suggested that two things must be in place in order for a person to enter the agentic state:
1. The person giving the orders is perceived as being qualified to direct other people’s behavior. That is,
they are seen as legitimate.

2. The person being ordered about is able to believe that the authority will accept responsibility for what
happens.
Agency theory says that people will obey an authority when they believe that the authority will take
responsibility for the consequences of their actions. This is supported by some aspects of Milgram’s
evidence. For example, when participants were reminded that they had responsibility for their own actions,
almost none of them were prepared to obey. In contrast, many participants who were refusing to go on did so
if the experimenter said that he would take responsibility.
Milgram Experiment Variations
The Milgram experiment was carried out many times whereby Milgram varied the basic procedure (changed
the IV). By doing this Milgram could identify which factors affected obedience (the DV). Obedience was
measured by how many participants shocked to the maximum 450 volts (65% in the original study).
In total 636 participants have been tested in 18 different variation studies.
Change of Location
Condition



The experiment was
moved to a set of run
down offices rather
than the impressive
Yale University.
Obedience dropped to
47.5%.
This suggests that
Two Teacher Condition



When there is less personal responsibility obedience increases.
When participants could instruct an assistant (confederate) to press the
switches, 92.5% shocked to the maximum 450 volts.
This relates to Milgram's Agency Theory.
14
status of location
effects obedience.
Touch Proximity Condition



The teacher had to
force the learner's hand
down onto a shock
plate when they refuse
to participate after 150
volts.
Obedience fell to 30%.
The participant is no
longer buffered /
protected from seeing
the consequences of
their actions.
Social Support Condition



Two other participants
(confederates) were
also teachers but
refused to obey.
Confederate 1 stopped
at 150 volts and
confederate 2 stopped
at 210 volts.
The presence of others
who are seen to
disobey the authority
figure reduces the level
of obedience to 10%.
Uniform Condition



Milgram’s experimenter wore a laboratory coat (a symbol of scientific
expertise) which gave him a high status.
But when the experimenter dressed in everyday clothes obedience was very
low.
The uniform of the authority figure can give them status.
Absent Experimenter Condition





Authority figure distant.
It is easier to resist the orders from an authority figure if they are not close by
When the experimenter instructed and prompted the teacher by telephone fro
another room, obedience fell to 20.5%.
Many participants cheated and missed out shocks or gave less voltage than
ordered to by the experimenter.
Proximity of authority figure effects obedience.
Critical Evaluation
The Milgram studies were conducted in laboratory type conditions and we must ask if this tells us much
about real-life situations. We obey in a variety of real-life situations that are far more subtle than instructions
to give people electric shocks, and it would be interesting to see what factors operate in everyday obedience.
The sort of situation Milgram investigated would be more suited to a military context.
Orne & Holland (1968) accused Milgram’s study of lacking ‘experimental realism’, i.e. participants might
not have believed the experimental set-up they found themselves in and knew the learner wasn’t really
receiving electric shocks.
Milgram's sample was biased:
 The participants in Milgram's study were all male. Do the findings transfer to females?
15
Milgram’s study cannot be seen as representative of the American population as his sample was selfselected. This is because they became participants only by electing to respond to a newspaper
advertisement (selecting themselves). They may also have a typical "volunteer personality" – not all
the newspaper readers responded so perhaps it takes this personality type to do so.
Yet a total of 636 participants were tested in 18 separate experiments across the New Haven area, which was
seen as being reasonably representative of a typical American town.
Milgram’s findings have been replicated in a variety of cultures and most lead to the same conclusions as
Milgram’s original study and in some cases see higher obedience rates.
However, Smith & Bond (1998) point out that with the exception of Jordan (Shanab & Yahya, 1978), the
majority of these studies have been conducted in industrialized Western cultures and we should be cautious
before we conclude that a universal trait of social behavior has been identified.
Ethical Issues
 Deception – the participants actually believed they were shocking a real person, and were unaware the
learner was a confederate of Milgram's.
However, Milgram argued that “illusion is used when necessary in order to set the stage for the revelation of
certain difficult-to-get-at-truths”.
Milgram also interviewed participants afterwards to find out the effect of the deception. Apparently 83.7%
said that they were “glad to be in the experiment”, and 1.3% said that they wished they had not been
involved.
 Protection of participants - Participants were exposed to extremely stressful situations that may have
the potential to cause psychological harm. Many of the participants were visibly distressed.
Signs of tension included trembling, sweating, stuttering, laughing nervously, biting lips and digging
fingernails into palms of hands. Three participants had uncontrollable seizures, and many pleaded to be
allowed to stop the experiment.
In his defence, Milgram argued that these effects were only short term. Once the participants were debriefed
(and could see the confederate was OK) their stress levels decreased. Milgram also interviewed the
participants one year after the event and concluded that most were happy that they had taken part.
 However, Milgram did debrief the participants fully after the experiment and also followed up after a
period of time to ensure that they came to no harm.
Milgram debriefed all his participants straight after the experiment and disclosed the true nature of the
experiment. Participants were assured that their behaviour was common and Milgram also followed the
sample up a year later and found that there were no signs of any long term psychological harm. In fact the
majority of the participants (83.7%) said that they were pleased that they had participated.
 Right to Withdrawal - The BPS states that researchers should make it plain to participants that they
are free to withdraw at any time (regardless of payment).
Did Milgram give participants an opportunity to withdraw? The experimenter gave four verbal prods which
essentially discouraged withdrawal from the experiment:
1. Please continue.
2. The experiment requires that you continue.
3. It is absolutely essential that you continue.
4. You have no other choice, you must go on.

16
Stereotypes
by Saul McLeod published 2008, updated 2015
Definition: A stereotype is “...a fixed, over generalized belief about a particular group or class of
people.” (Cardwell, 1996).
For example, a “hells angel” biker dresses in leather.
One advantage of a stereotype is that it enables us to respond rapidly to situations because we may
have had a similar experience before.
One disadvantage is that it makes us ignore differences between individuals; therefore we think things
about people that might not be true (i.e. make generalizations).
The use of stereotypes is a major way in which we simplify our social world; since they reduce the
amount of processing (i.e. thinking) we have to do when we meet a new person.
By stereotyping we infer that a person has a whole range of characteristics and abilities that we assume
all members of that group have. Stereotypes lead to social categorization, which is one of the reasons
for prejudice attitudes (i.e. “them” and “us” mentality) which leads to in-groups and out-groups.
Most stereotypes probably tend to convey a negative impression. Positive examples would include
judges (the phrase “sober as a judge” would suggest this is a stereotype with a very respectable set of
characteristics), overweight people (who are often seen as “jolly”) and television news readers (usually
seen as highly dependable, respectable and impartial). Negative stereotypes seem far more common,
however.
Racial Stereotypes
17
Researchers have found that stereotypes exist of different races, cultures or ethnic groups. Although the
terms race, culture and ethnic groups have different meanings, we shall take them to mean roughly the
same thing at the moment.
The most famous study of racial stereotyping was published by Katz and Braly in 1933 when they
reported the results of a questionnaire completed by students at Princeton University in the USA.
They found that students held clear, negative stereotypes – few students expressed any difficulty in
responding to the questionnaire.
Most students at that time would have been white Americans and the pictures of other ethnic groups
included Jews as shrewd and mercenary, Japanese as shrewd and sly, Negroes as lazy and happy-golucky and Americans as industrious and intelligent.
Not surprisingly, racial stereotypes always seem to favor the race of the holder and belittle other races.
It is probably true to say that every ethnic group has racial stereotypes of other groups.
Some psychologists argue that it is a “natural” aspect of human behavior, which can be seen to benefit
each group because it helps in the long-run to identify with one’s own ethnic group and so find
protection and promote the safety and success of the group. There is no evidence for this view,
however, and many writers argue that it is merely a way of justifying racist attitudes and behaviors.
Katz and Braly (1933) – Racial Stereotyping
Aim: To investigate stereotypical attitudes of Americans towards different races.
Method: Questionnaire method was used to investigate stereotypes. American university students were
given a list of nationalities and ethic groups (e.g. Irish, Germans etc.), and a list of 84 personality traits.
They were asked to pick out five or six traits which they thought were typical of each group.
Results: There was considerable agreement in the traits selected. White Americans, for example, were
seen as industrious, progressive and ambitious. African Americans were seen as lazy, ignorant and
musical. Participants were quite ready to rate ethnic groups with whom they had no personal contact.
Conclusion: Ethnic stereotypes are widespread, and shared by members of a particular social group.
Research Evaluation
The Katz and Braly studies were done in the 1930’s and it can be argued that cultures have changed
since then and we are much less likely to hold these stereotypes.
Later studies conducted in 1951 and 1967 found changes in the stereotypes and the extent to which
they are held. In general, stereotypes in the later study tended to be more positive but the belief that
particular ethnic groups held particular characteristics still existed.
18
Also, it should be noted that this study has relied entirely on verbal reports and is therefore extremely
low in ecological validity. Just because participants in a study will trot out stereotypes when asked does
not mean to say that people go around acting on them. People do not necessarily behave as though the
stereotypes are true.
The limited information that the experiments are given is also likely to create demand characteristics
(i.e. participants figure out what the experiment is about and change their behavior, for example give
the results the psychologist wants).
Finally, there is the problem of social desirability with questionnaire research – people may lie.
Stereotype Threat
A “stereotype threat” arises when one is in a situation where one has the fear of doing something that
would inadvertently confirm a negative stereotype. It is cued by the mere recognition that a negative
group stereotype could apply to you in a given situation.
It is important to understand that the person may experience a threat even if he or she does not believe
the stereotype. Simply, in the context, the person perceives that the stereotype is a plausible
characterization of himself or herself by others (Steele & Aronson, 1995).
Steele and Aronson (1995) conducted an experiment involving African American and White college
students who took a difficult test using items from an aptitude test (American GRE Verbal exam) under
one of two conditions.
In the stereotype threat condition, students were told that their performance on the test would be a good
indicator of their underlying intellectual abilities. In the non-threat condition, they were told that the
test was simply a problem solving exercise and was not diagnostic of ability.
Performance was compared in the two conditions and results showed that African American
participants performed less well than their white counterparts in the stereotype threat condition, but in
the non-threat condition their performance equaled that of their white counterparts.
In another study (Shih, Pittinsky, and Ambady, 1999) Asian women were subtly reminded (with a
questionnaire) of either their Asian identity or their female identity prior to taking a difficult math test.
Results showed that women reminded of their ‘Asianness’ performed better than the control group and
women reminded of their female identity performed worse than the control group.
According to Steele, stereotype threat generates “spotlight anxiety” (Steele & Aronson, 1995, p. 809),
which causes emotional distress and “vigilant worry” that may undermine performance. Students worry
that their future may be compromised by society’s perception and treatment of their group so they do
not focus their full attention on the test questions.
Students taking the test under stereotype threat might also become inefficient on the test by rereading
the questions and the answer choices, as well as rechecking their answers, more than when not under
stereotype threat. It also can induce “attributional ambiguity” —a person gets a low grade and asks, “Is
it something about me or because of my race?”
19
Social Roles
by Saul McLeod published 2008
There are many ways that people can influence our behavior, but perhaps one of the most important is
that the presence of others seems to set up expectations
We do not expect people to behave randomly but to behave in certain ways in particular situations.
Each social situation entails its own particular set of expectations about the “proper” way to behave.
Such expectations can vary from group to group.
One way in which these expectations become apparent is when we look at the roles that people play in
society.
Social roles are the part people play as members of a social group. With each social role you adopt,
your behavior changes to fit the expectations both you and others have of that role.
In the words of William Shakespeare:
All the worlds a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits, and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts.
These lines capture the essence of social roles. Think of how many roles you play in a single day, e.g.
son, daughter, sister, brother, students, worker, friend etc. Each social role carries expected behaviors
called norms.
Social Norms
Social Norms are unwritten rules about how to behave. They provide us with an expected idea of how
to behave in a particular social group or culture. For example we expect students to arrive to lesson on
time and complete their work.
The idea of norms provides a key to understanding social influence in general and conformity in
particular. Social norms are the accepted standards of behavior of social groups.
These groups range from friendship and work groups to nation states. Behavior which fulfills these
norms is called conformity, and most of the time roles and norms are powerful ways of understanding
and predicting what people will do.
There are norms defining appropriate behavior for every social group. For example, students, neighbors
and patients in a hospital are all aware of the norms governing behavior. And as the individual moves
from one group to another, their behavior changes accordingly.
20
Norms provide order in society. It is difficult to see how human society could operate without social
norms. Human beings need norms to guide and direct their behavior, to provide order and predictability
in social relationships and to make sense of and understanding of each other’s actions. These are some
of the reasons why most people, most of the time, conform to social norms.
Conclusion
There is considerable pressure to conform to social roles. Social roles provide an example of social
influence in general and conformity in particular. Most of us, most of the time, conform to the
guidelines provided by the roles we perform.
We conform to the expectations of others, we respond to their approval when we play our roles well,
and to their disapproval when we play our roles badly. But how far will conformity go? Zimbardo’s
Stanford Prison Experiment illustrates the power of social roles in relation to conformity.
21
Self Concept
by Saul McLeod published 2008
The term self-concept is a general term used to refer to how someone thinks about, evaluates or
perceives themselves. To be aware of oneself is to have a concept of oneself.
Baumeister (1999) provides the following self concept definition:
"The individual's belief about himself or herself, including the person's attributes and who and what the
self is".
Self Concept is an important term for both social psychology and humanism. Lewis (1990) suggests
that development of a concept of self has two aspects:
(1) The Existential Self
This is 'the most basic part of the self-scheme or self-concept; the sense of being separate and distinct
from others and the awareness of the constancy of the self' (Bee, 1992).
The child realizes that they exist as a separate entity from others and that they continue to exist over
time and space.
According to Lewis awareness of the existential self begins as young as two to three months old and
arises in part due to the relation the child has with the world. For example, the child smiles and
someone smiles back, or the child touches a mobile and sees it move.
(2) The Categorical Self
Having realized that he or she exists as a separate experiencing being, the child next becomes aware
that he or she is also an object in the world.
Just as other objects including people have properties that can be experienced (big, small, red, smooth
and so on) so the child is becoming aware of him or her self as an object which can be experienced and
which has properties.
The self too can be put into categories such as age, gender, size or skill. Two of the first categories to
be applied are age (“I am 3”) and gender (“I am a girl”).
In early childhood. the categories children apply to themselves are very concrete (e.g. hair color, height
and favorite things). Later, self-description also begins to include reference to internal psychological
traits, comparative evaluations and to how others see them.
Carl Rogers (1959) believes that the self concept has three different components:

The view you have of yourself (self image)
22


How much value you place on yourself (self esteem or self-worth)
What you wish you were really like (ideal self)
Self Image
(what you see in yourself)
This does not necessarily have to reflect reality. Indeed a person with anorexia who is thin may have a
self image in which the person believes they are fat. A person's self image is affected by many factors,
such as parental influences, friends, the media etc.
Kuhn (1960) investigated the self-image by using The Twenty Statements Test.
He asked people to answer the question 'Who am I?' in 20 different ways. He found that the responses
could be divided into two major groups. These were social roles(external or objective aspects of oneself
such as son, teacher, friend) and personality traits (internal or affective aspects of oneself such as
gregarious, impatient, humorous).
The list of answers to the question “Who Am I?” probably include examples of each of the following
four types of responses:
1) Physical Description: I’m tall, have blue eyes...etc.
2) Social Roles: We are all social beings whose behavior is shaped to some extent by the roles
we play. Such roles as student, housewife, or member of the football team not only help others
to recognize us but also help us to know what is expected of us in various situations.
3) Personal Traits: These are a third dimension of our self-descriptions. “I’m impulsive...I’m
generous...I tend to worry a lot”...etc.
4) Existential Statements (abstract ones): These can range from "I’m a child of the universe" to
"I’m a human being" to "I’m a spiritual being"...etc.
Typically young people describe themselves more in terms of personal traits, whereas older people feel
defined to a greater extent by their social roles.
23
Self Esteem and Self Worth
(the extent to which you value yourself)
Self esteem refers to the extent to which we like accept or approve of ourselves or how much we value
ourselves. Self esteem always involves a degree of evaluation and we may have either a positive or a
negative view of ourselves.
HIGH SELF ESTEEM i.e. we have a positive view of ourselves. This tends to lead to




Confidence in our own abilities
Self acceptance
Not worrying about what others think
Optimism
LOW SELF ESTEEM i.e. we have a negative view of ourselves. This tends to lead to




Lack of confidence
Want to be/look like someone else
Always worrying what others might think
Pessimism
There are several ways of measuring self-esteem. For example, Harrill Self Esteem Inventory is a
questionnaire comprising 15 statements about a range of interest. Another example is the Thematic
Apperception Test (TAT), which is a neutral cartoon given to the participant who then has to devise a
story about what's going on.
Morse and Gergen (1970) showed that in uncertain or anxiety arousing situations our self-esteem may
change rapidly. Participants were waiting for a job interview in a waiting room. They were sat with
another candidate (a confederate of the experimenter) in one of two conditions:
A) Mr. Clean - dressed in smart suit, carrying a briefcase opened to reveal a slide rule and books.
B) Mr. Dirty - dressed in an old T-shirt and jeans, slouched over a cheap sex novel.
Self-esteem of participants with Mr. Dirty increased whilst those with Mr. Clean decreased! No
mention made of how this affected subjects’ performance in interview. Level of self-esteem affects
performance at numerous tasks though (Coopersmith, 1967) so could expect Mr. Dirty subjects to
perform better than Mr. Clean.
Even though self-esteem might fluctuate, there are times when we continue to believe good things
about ourselves even when evidence to the contrary exists. This is known as the perseverance effect.
Miller and Ross (1975) showed that people who believed they had socially desirable characteristics
continued in this belief even when the experimenters tried to get them to believe the opposite. Does the
same thing happen with bad things if we have low self-esteem? Maybe not, perhaps with very low
self-esteem all we believe about ourselves might be bad.
Argyle (2008) believes there are 4 major factors that influence self esteem.
24
1) THE REACTION OF OTHERS. If people admire us, flatter us, seek out our company,
listen attentively and agree with us we tend to develop a positive self-image. If they avoid us,
neglect us, tell us things about ourselves that we don’t want to hear we develop a negative selfimage.
2) COMPARISON WITH OTHERS. If the people we compare ourselves with (our reference
group) appear to be more successful, happier, richer, better looking than ourselves we tend to
develop a negative self image BUT if they are less successful than us our image will be positive.
3) SOCIAL ROLES. Some social roles carry prestige e.g. doctor, airline pilot, TV. presenter,
premiership footballer and this promotes self-esteem. Other roles carry stigma. E.g. prisoner,
mental hospital patient, refuse collector or unemployed person.
4) IDENTIFICATION. Roles aren’t just “out there.” They also become part of our personality
i.e. we identity with the positions we occupy, the roles we play and the groups we belong to.
But just as important as all these factors, are the influence of our parents! (See Coopersmith’s
research.)
Ideal Self
(what you'd like to be)
If there is a mismatch between how you see yourself (e.g. your self image) and what you’d like to be
(e.g. your ideal self ) then this is likely to affect how much you value yourself.
Therefore, there is an intimate relationship between self-image, ego-ideal and self-esteem. Humanistic
psychologists study this using the Q-Sort Method.
A person’s ideal self may not be consistent with what actually happens in life and experiences of the
person. Hence, a difference may exist between a person’s ideal self and actual experience. This is
called incongruence.
25
Where a person’s ideal self and actual experience are consistent or very similar, a state of congruence
exists. Rarely, if ever does a total state of congruence exist; all people experience a certain amount of
incongruence. The development of congruence is dependent on unconditional positive regard. Roger’s
believed that for a person to achieve self-actualization they must be in a state of congruence.
Michael Argyle (2008) says there are four major factors which influence its development:




The ways in which others (particularly significant others) react to us.
How we think we compare to others
Our social roles
The extent to which we identify with other people
26