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AQA, Psychology, B - Annoying 10 Marker

Okay, I got 7 for this little thing. Pleassse tell me where I went wrong because it's annoying the hell out of me:

"Stuart is a soldier who is on an army teraining course. One day the trainees are ordered to march across mountain country. The officer instructing them orders them to work alone and not stop to help each other. Near the end of the march, Stuart hears another trainee shouting for help. Describe and discuss factors which might influence whether or not Stuart will disobey orders and stop to help the other trainee. Refer to empirical evidence in your answer (10 marks)"

My answer:

d) Obedience is the 'abdication of individual judgement in the face of some external pressure', for example a policeman telling you to pick up a bag and you doing so, according to Stanley Milgram, who, in the 1960s did a famous experiment on conformity (I realise that should've said "obedience"). His aim was to see how far people would go in obeying an authority figure. His method involved placing an advert in a newspaper inviting 20 - 50 year old white males to come to Yale University to participate in an experiment stuying, apparently, the effects of punishment on learning. There they were met by a tall white male experimenter and had to draw slips asying either "teacher" or "learner" on them. However, this was rigged and half of the "participants" were confederates of Milgram, told to claim to be the "learner" despite all slips asying "teacher". The "learner was strapped to an electrical shock inducing device and the teacher instructed to give shocks, each more powerful than the last every time the learner was inocrrect. When the learners asked to desist they were told the 'experiment rquired' them to continue.

Milgram found that 65% of people were willing to give shocks up to a deadly 450V marked XXX on the machine. However, none of the shocks were real as the "learners" were actors.

There were of course a number of methodological and ethical weaknesses with this study. Research is dated from the 1960s and attitudes to authority may have changed since then. Sampling was poor, as results may only reflect white males from 20 - 50 and there was low ecological validy as this did not resemble a typical real-life situation. Ethical weaknesses incldued deception leading to a lack of informed cosnent as well as the right to withdraw denied and mental harm, or stress caused to participants who thought they were giving actual shocks.

However, Milgram found in several variations of his study that different factors affect obedience. He discovered that, when someone else was responsible for giving shocks, obedience rose to 92.5%. Thus, obedience will be higher and Stuart is less likely to help if he feels soemoen else is responsible. Milgram also found that when the experiment was conducted in a run-down office block rather than the prestige of Yale Unviersity, obedience fell to 48%. Therefore, the environment may affect Stuart's decision. Perhaps he is less likely to obey because of the rather disorganised environment of the mountain country. When Milgram put the "victim" in the same room as the teacher, obedience fell to 40% as they could see the effects of the shocks on the learner. Ergo, Stuart is less likely to obey orders and not help if his proximity to said "victim" is closer. Another factor is the proximity of the authority figure - Milgram noted that when the experimenter gave orders to electrocute over the phone, obedience lowered still to 20% and people gave lower shocks than instructed. Thus, in Stuart's case the proximity of the instructor will affect how much he obeys. If the instructor is closer, he is more likely to obey. When given the support of others Milgram found that obedience fell to 10%. Note: this is when others also defied. If they obeyed, obeyance from the learner would have been more likely. Thus, if someone else obeys and suggests to Stuart not to help, he is also more likely to obey. The converse is also true. One final factor that Milgram found affected obedience is the personality of the person who obeys or defies. Some people are anti-authority and independant making them less likely to obey, whereas other passive people are more likely to. Therefore, if Stuart is independant, he is less likely to obey and vice-versa.

Overall, the factors that will affect Stuart's decision are: Responsibility factor, environment, proximity of victim, proximity of authority, support of others and personality.

Reply 1

jt0316

i think u might hav been too vague on AO1? for AO2 it was really gud. But then again if i was markin it i wud hav given u 10 cos thats what i always write (amount of detail i mean). u hav been unfairly marked, worth 10/10 in my opinion!

Reply 2

HearTheThunder

jt0316

i think u might hav been too vague on AO1? for AO2 it was really gud. But then again if i was markin it i wud hav given u 10 cos thats what i always right (amount of detail i mean). u hav been unfairly marked, worth 10/10 in my opinion!

Umm, what's AO1 and which areas was I being too vague in?

Reply 3

jt0316

erm.. maybe you could say the shock intensity ranged from XX to 450V (cant remember what it was exactly, cant be bothered to check). explain the situation of the task (as in the learner and teacher were in different rooms) and then explain the variations of the task, he did it again in a run down office, where the authority figure was dressed inappropriately, where the learner and teacher were in the same room etc. then state the actual results for this and say that despite a decrease in obedience, the results showed a positive correlation to the original task and say how this showed the reliability of his experiment.
i think you just basically need to state more facts to get more marks on AO1, because you havent expanded your points that much. so try to expand your points in relation to the variation of the experiment and to obedience as a whole.
other than that i dont actually know how you can improve it.. but hope ive helped a bit!!

Reply 4

jt0316

also, was that 7/10 marked by the examiners or your teacher?? cos maybe your teacher was just bein a perfectionist?? ask for the examiner's mark scheme, that shud help you more!!