Milgram's Experiments Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Milgrams Experiments - Essay ExampleAfter World fight II, in the Nuremberg War Crimes trials, a common defense of those accused of these crimes against humanity was obedience.. The prevalence of this justification is what prompted Stanley Milgram to perform his experiments.Milgrams experiments focused on the conflict between obedience to authority and a persons conscience.Milgram recruited participants through newspaper advertisements calling for anyone interested in getting paid for participating in an experiment supposedly intending to determine the effect of punishment on learning. The participant (the subject) is introduced to a stern-looking experimenter in a white coat and to a second participant that the subject understands was recruited in the same way that he was. This second participant, who is pleasant and friendly to the subject, is actually an accomplice of the experimenter.Under the directions of the experimenter the subject, minded(p) the role of teacher, is made to inflict electric shocks of increasing power for every mistake that the former(a) participant (the learner) makes in answering some questions. The experimenter and the teacher are in the same manner while the learner is in an adjoining room. 65% of the teachers obeyed all orders and went to the maximum of 450 volts administered to the learner, even though approximately of the subjects were extremely uncomfortable in delivering the punishment. None of the subjects stopped punishing before reaching 300 volts.