WHAT ARE INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN OBEDIENCE & PREJUDICE?

Individual Differences refers to variables that make one person different from another.

The social theories of obedience tend to ignore these individual differences, concentrating instead on processes that are universal and apply to everyone. Instead of focusing on the minority of people who disobey, social psychologists like Milgram concentrate on the obedient majority and draw conclusions from them.
​Social theories explain how individuals may receive different levels of social force from other people, leading to different degrees of social impact and therefore different levels of obedience. However, there may be some people whose personalities make them naturally inclined towards obedience or disobedience.

CULTURAL DIFFERENCES

Culture includes all the behaviours and beliefs (cognitions) that you learn by growing up in a particular community. Cultural variables include things like:

  • Deference: how important is it to show respect to people in authority?
  • Individualism: how important is it to be an individual or to be a part of the group?
  • Justice: how important is it for people to do as they promised and get what they deserve?
  • Shame: how important is it to "save face" in the presence of other people and not look bad?

You can imagine that in a highly deferential culture, it is harder for people to go against authority figures; in a strongly individualistic culture, it may be easier. Modern Western culture is considered to be very individualistic but non-deferential (although back in the 1960s when Milgram did his experiments, it was rather more deferential).

In a "face saving" culture it is important for people not to be shamed by failing at something and this might make people more obedient. In cultures which strongly values justice, a person might feel an obligation to obey if they've previously signed a contract or received a payment; they might feel less worry about obeying if the 'victim' seems to deserve punishment (by getting the answers wrong, in the case of Milgram).
Culture usually applies to countries or even whole continents. However, smaller groups can have a sub-culture that might affect obedience. Bikers might be less deferential but the army has a strong culture of obedience.
Is this guy going to obey?
DEVELOPMENTAL DIFFERENCES
A stereotypical view would be that young children are particularly submissive, with disobedience rising during the rebellious teenage years, then people becoming more obedient as they get older.

But is this really true? And what about the other stereotype, that young children tend to be "naughty", that teenagers are very conforming and that older people have the confidence and wisdom to object to immoral orders?

Milgram used participants between the ages of 20 and 50, but he never analysed his results by age group.

Shanab & Yahya (1977) replicated Milgram's study with children and teenagers at the University of Jordan. They compared 6-8 year-olds, 10-12 year-olds and 14-16 year-olds but didn't find any statistical differences in obedience between the age groups. 73% went all the way to 450V, slightly higher than Milgram's baseline result of 65%.
Yup. Shanab & Yahya put six year-olds through the Milgram study. Whew!

Not put off by making children cry, Shanab & Yahya replicated the experiment again, a year later, with even more shocking (!) conclusions...
This suggests there is no great change in obedience with age - or perhaps different factors associated with age cancel each other out (eg teenagers are less respectful of authority but lack the confidence to disobey a direct order).
GENDER DIFFERENCES
You might expect gender differences in obedience. Maybe females are raised to be more compliant and follow instructions better than males. Alternatively, maybe females are less likely to follow aggressive instructions - this ties in with some biological views about aggression.

Or perhaps these two factors cancel each other out?

Variation #8 tested 40 women and Milgram compared the results with the baseline study of men. The results were the same, with 65% going to 450V.
Burger (2009) also found no statistical  difference in obedience between men and women. Other obedience studies by Shanab & Yahya (1978) and Meeus & Raaijmakers (1986) similarly found no difference in male and female obedience.

Kilham & Mann (1974) tested gender differences in obedience among Australian students. They replicated Milgram's study but found that only 16% of women obeyed compared to 40% of men (Milgram found 65% of men and women obeyed). However, in this study the women were being ordered to shock another woman by a male authority figure, so they may have sided with the victim instead.
Eastenders actress Natalie Cassidy settles the debate about women submitting to authority figures
PERSONALITY DIFFERENCES
Milgram's Variation #5 was the "empathy" variation, where Mr Wallace mentioned having a heart condition and, at 150V, started complaining about chest pains. More participants dropped out 150V, long before Mr Wallace went silent at 300V. However, participants who continued after 150V seemed to feel they had “passed a point of no return” and continued all the way to 450V, so overall the results were similar to the baseline study.

Burger (2009) uses this variation as the basis for his Contemporary Study. He also tested participants for "empathy" and "autonomy" (need for control) beforehand. Empathy scores didn't make any difference to obedience but autonomy scores did. Burger concludes that people who have a psychological need to be in control of their own lives may be slightly more disobedient. However, being empathic (sensitive to other people's feelings) doesn't make you likely to disobey cruel orders.
In terms of personality traits, high E individuals would have the temperament to rebel against authority and high N individuals would be unsuited to following orders (because they don't learn easily), therefore a Neurotic Extrovert would be most likely to disobey.

OTHER DIFFERENCES: THE AUTHORITARIAN PERSONALITY
THE FASCIST INSIDE ALL OF US

Theodor Adorno (1950) and his colleagues at Berkeley University offered an explanation for obedience to the Nazis and the Holocaust based on the Authoritarian Personality type. Authoritarian personalities respect authority figures but also delight in being an authority figure: they obey their superiors without question, but they bully and oppress their followers in turn.

Adorno suggests that people with Authoritarian Personalities are drawn to beliefs like Nazism and tend to get promoted quickly in Nazi-style organisations. The team at Berkeley created a questionnaire called the F-Scale (F for "Fascism") to measure the Authoritarian Personality.
AUTHORITARIAN CHARACTERISTICS
  • Very conventional beliefs about right and wrong
  • Respect for authority
  • Belief in aggression toward those who are different
  • A negative view of people in general
  • A need for strong leadership
  • A black and white worldview.
  • A tendency to project own feelings of inadequacy, rage and fear onto a group of scapegoats
  • A preoccupation with violence and sex
Adorno offered a psychodynamic (Freudian) explanation for the Authoritarian Personality.
  • Such people have a strong id but a weak ego: they are driven by powerful antisocial urges.
  • They also have a strict super-ego that makes them feel guilty and ashamed.
  • When authority figures give them immoral orders, they can act out their wicked desires without guilt.
  • They use a defense mechanism called projection and project their sense of shame and weakness onto people who have less power than them, which is why they love giving orders and being bullies.
People with Authoritarian Personalities are terrified of being weak, which is why they despise people who are weaker than them. They repress their own urges most of the time, which is why they are disturbed by free-spirited individuals who act on their feelings. This is why authoritarians tend to pick on non-conformists, homosexuals and hippies.  This type of personality theory is often used to explain homophobia.
The protest singer Woody Guthrie had the message "THIS MACHINE KILLS FASCISTS" on his guitar. How cool is that?
Milgram’s assistant Alan Elms (Elms & Milgram, 1966) tested the 20 most obedient and the 20 most rebellious participants from Milgram’s first 4 experiments. Elms used Adorno’s F-Scale questionnaire. He found that those who tested highest on the F-Scale gave more shocks and held the shock buttons down longer than those who were low scorers.

APPLYING THESE FACTORS TO OBEDIENCE
AO2

Criminal Gangs

Criminal gangs often give gang-members orders to do illegal and immoral things. There have been some shocking stories of knife and gun crimes carried out by young people acting on orders from gang leaders as a sort of "initiation test" to show they a worthy of joining the gang. Organisations like GangslIne try to influence young people to leave behind a life of violence.
Click on the image to read an inspirational article about Gangsline. Follow the link to the Gangsline website.
Psychological research suggests that young men and young women are equally at risk from the pressure to follow orders from gang leaders (except, perhaps, in Australia!). This might explain the rise in young women joining violent gangs.
If there are personality factors in obedience, these could be identified early. The F-Scale could be used to test school children for the Authoritarian Personality. Those who score particularly highly could be targeted for counseling and support to stop them joining gangs. This idea is supported by Shanab & Yahya (1977) who found that obedience stayed quite constant between 6 and 16.

EVALUATING INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN OBEDIENCE/PREJUDICE (AO3)
SWAC

Strengths

These theories and findings are also backed up by human experience. The idea that some people are "natural followers" or else are inclined to be prejudiced and suspicious of strangers is common sense - it has face validity.

The idea that some cultures are more inclined towards following their leaders or are more hostile towards foreigners is also widely believed. This is sometimes called the "Little Englander" mentality in Britain. Some cultures do have a reputation for looking down on other nations or races as inferior (this criticism has, at various times, been directed at the Russians, the Germans, the Japanese and of course the British).

The idea of individual differences would explain things like why not all of the participants in Milgram's study obeyed the authority figure and why some of the boys in Sheriff's study were more hostile towards their rivals than others.

Weaknesses

Not all of this research is consistent. The results of Kilham & Mann (1974) contradict the other findings because the Australians have such low levels of obedience and the females are so much lower than the males. This might be because the women sided with a female Learner against the male Experimenter. Shanab & Yahya (1978) deliberately corrected this by making the Experimenter the same sex as the Learner and they found no gender difference in obedience.

It's also very hard to pin down just what sort of personality makes people inclined towards obedience or prejudice. Burger found, to his surprise, that high levels of empathy did not make people more likely to disobey cruel orders - the trait that made a difference was a need for personal autonomy, which is something that doesn't even feature in Adorno's Authoritarian Personality. Adorno's research has been criticised for its political bias because he identifies being right-wing with being mentally ill and evil. In history, there have been left-wing tyrants who demanded blind obedience (eg Stalin) and right-wing regimes that weren't particularly racist (eg Facist Italy in the 1930s).

Applications

Individual differences might help teachers devise strategies for identifying disobedient or over-obedient students early on. The F-Scale could be used to pick out children who have the Authoritarian Personality that would be drawn to joining gangs.

Cultural differences are harder to apply in the real world, because racial profiling is such a sensitive topic. Stereotyping whole communities as "over-obedient" or "disobedient" leads to a feeling of being discriminated against and accusations of racism. Even carrying out research into these topics raises ethical issues about risk, labelling and the public good.

Comparisons

The big debate in obedience is between those who prefer dispositional explanations (like Theodor Adorno and his Authoritarian Personality) and those who prefer situational explanations (like Milgram and his Agentic State). The real answer is probably "a bit of both". This mirrors the Nature/Nurture Debate in psychology, because we learn to be obedient through our environment, but some of us are probably born with a greater or lesser predisposition towards following orders.

Obedience research can also be compared with research into intergroup prejudice. Most of the behaviour studied by researchers into obedience can also be explained as intergroup conflict. For example, the participants in Milgram's studies saw themselves as part of the same group as the Experimenter (they were assisting him and sat in the same room as him) and viewed Mr Wallace the Learner as an "outgroup member" (he sat in a different room and did not receive any attention from the Experimenter). The participants were less likely to shock the Learner if the intergroup identity was less clear; for example, if the Experimenter left the room it didn't feel as if they were part of his group. This also explains the odd findings of the Australian study, because the female participants saw the female Learner as part of their ingroup and the male Experimenter as a member of the outgroup.

EXEMPLAR ESSAY
How to write a 8-mark answer

Evaluate the importance of individual differences in obedience. (8 marks)
  • A 8-mark “evaluate” question awards 4 marks for describing factors (AO1) and 4 marks for AO3 (Evaluate). Don't forget to add a conclusion so that you can get into the top band (7-8 marks).

Description
Individual differences are things that make people distinctive, like their age and sex and education. It includes personality types that may be especially obedient.
Theodor Adorno researched the Authoritarian Personality that likes obeying orders and making other people obey orders too.
Most research suggests gender is not a factor in obedience. Milgram and Shanab & Yahya both found women to be as obedient as men.
However, Kilham & Mann's Australian study showed everyone to be about half as obedient as the Americans, with only 16% of women obeying compared to 65% of Americans.

Evaluation
Individual differences are backed up by lots of studies but so are situational factors. Adorno supports the dispositional view and Milgram the situational one.
The idea of an authoritarian personality would explain why 35% of Milgram's participants did not obey up to 450V.
However, Authoritarian Personality has been criticised for political bias because there is blind obedience in Stalin's Communist regime as well as Hitler's Fascist regime.
It's possible that intergroup discrimination explains obedience better than personality; Milgram's participants may have seen Mr Wallace as an outgroup member.

Conclusion
The idea of prejudice rather than obedience makes sense because in an Australian study, women were very disobedient when a man ordered them to shock another woman..
  • Notice that for a 8-mark answer you don’t have to include everything about factors in obedience. I haven’t mentioned age or the other cultural variables, But I have tried to make the two halves – Summary and Evaluation– evenly balanced.