Experiment on obedience to authority figures

1. The Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures was a series of notable social psychology experiments conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram in the 1960s.
   The Milgram experiment investigated whether study participants would obey commands to administer increasingly painful “shocks” to other particpants who were actually actors only pretending to be shocked.
   View the Milgram Experiment (Revisited) and answer the questions that follow below. Response should be no less than 2-3 sentences in length. 

   Milgram Experiment (Derren Brown)
   User: n/a – Added: 7/15/07YouTube URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6GxIuljT3w1. Why were so many of Milgram’s research subjects willing to inflict severe electric
   shocks on their supposed victims, consider German sociologist Max Weber,
   who said that power is the ability to exercise one’s will over others (Weber 1922)?
   Why did other volunteers refuse to obey orders?

   2. Based on the results of the Milgram experiment, do you think that individuals who “compromise their own ethics in order to obey authority” are responsible for the treatment for the treatment of another, if the authority figure was giving instructions to harm the other individual?
   3. Why do you think individuals follow the instuctions of authority so closely, even if they are technically able to “disobey”? Why do you think the individuals in the study administered deadly shocks to the “learner” in the experiment, even though they knew that it was wrong?
   4. Are there certain qualities that differentiate authority figures? Would certain qualities lead you to follow one instead of another? (Name some qualities)

   QUESTION 2

2. Zimbardo (1973) conducted an extremely controversial study on conformity to social roles, called the Stanford Prison Experiment.His aim was to examine whether people would conform to the social roles of a prison guard or prisoner, when placed in a mock prison environment.Watch the short trailer or the actual experiment to answer the questions below.
   The Stanford Prison Experiment Official Trailer #1 (2015) Ezra Miller Thriller Movie HD
   User: n/a – Added: 6/12/15
   1. Explain how each of the three major theoretical paradigms (structural functionalism, symbolic interactionism, and conflict theory) might be used in looking at the issue presented in this clip and share a specific example of each.

QUESTION 3

1. George Ritzer, McDonaldization
   Copy and paste the weblink below into a new browser. Then review McDonaldization and answer the questions that follow
   http://www.mcdonaldization.com/whatisit.shtml

   1. According to George Ritzer, what is McDonaldization in your own words?
   2. What are the four dimensions of McDonaldization, explain in your own words?