Obey at Any Cost!! In 1963, the research about obedience was done by Stanley Milgram, had been become one of the most critical studies of psychology's history. His biggest discuss how people can do such harmful things to others by following someone's order. It must be some kinds of effects on human behavior that need to be explored. The matter got a lot of attention from behavioral scientists and became a challenge for them to discover the mystery of human ability. Theoretical propositions In Milgram's hypothesis, humans seem to be influenced and follow other people's orders, who have authorities over them, and break their code of moral and ethical behavior. For example, there are a lot of people who have done physical harm on people by following others' orders who have potent authorities. Method and Result Milgram decided to do a test on the power of obedience in the laboratory. He used the shock generator with 30 toggle switches labeled with
voltage levels starting at 30 volts and increasing by 15volt intervals up to 450 volts. There were 40 males, in between the ages of 20 and 50, got paid to participants in the study and two other persons, played as the experimenter. The learner's arms and body were strapped down to the chair and wired up with electrodes connect to the shock generator, and answer the questions with various pairs of words, which are not easy to memorize, posed by the teacher from the next room. The teacher was instructed by the experimenter to turn on an electric shock every time the learner answer incorrectly and moved the shock up to one level for every wrong answer (no subject suspected that there were not any shocks being delivered). As the amount of voltage being increasing with incorrect answers, learner started to shout his discomfort, and at the 300volt level, he demanded to be let out. After 300 volts he refused to continue the session. As he refused, the teacher decided to treat it like the wrong answer and keep increasing the shocks. The experimenter ordered
the subjects to keep continuing with commands and measured their levels of obedience based on how many switches they could turn on. The highest level would be referred to as obedient subjects, and the lower point will be defiant subjects.
After the procedure, there were 35% of the subjects gave up before reaching the maximum voltage, and 65% followed the other and reached to the highest voltage. Significance of Finding and Conclusion Milgram found out that the physical, emotional, and distance of the victim from the teacher (or experimenter) affected the amount of obedience. Furthermore, he pointed out that the obedience-toauthority process must consider the interaction of external and internal influences.