H567/02 Section A - Responses to people in authority: comparing the pair
Compare what Milgram and Bocchiaro reveal about authority, including their methods, changing ethical designs, and the limits of claims about individual and cultural diversity.
Shared theme and evidence
Both studies examine a conflict between an apparently legitimate research authority and another person's welfare.
Milgram's teacher was instructed to give escalating supposed shocks to a learner; Bocchiaro's student was asked to promote an apparently harmful study while concealing its risks. Both placed participants in unfamiliar university settings where trust in scientific authority could compete with personal responsibility. This is a social explanation: the authority relationship and institutional expectations matter, rather than behaviour being attributed only to a fixed cruel personality.
Majority compliance occurred in both: 26/40 (65%) reached Milgram's maximum and 114/149 (76.5%) obeyed without reporting in Bocchiaro. Both therefore challenge an assumption that ordinary people will reliably resist an unethical request. Neither found universal obedience. Milgram had 14 refusals; Bocchiaro had 21 refusals without reporting and 14 whistleblowers.
Prediction groups underestimated obedience. Milgram's 14 psychology seniors predicted a mean maximum-obedience rate of 1.2%; Bocchiaro's comparison students predicted only 3.6% obedience for themselves and 18.8% for an average student. The aligned conclusion is that detached moral predictions can differ greatly from action in an actual authority situation. Prediction groups were separate samples, so neither comparison demonstrates a within-person change from an earlier promise to later behaviour.
Comparing methods and measures
The studies share control and deception but operationalise responses to authority differently.
| Feature | Milgram (1963 condition) | Bocchiaro et al. (2012) | Consequence of the comparison |
|---|---|---|---|
| Setting and design | Controlled observation at Yale; everyone received the same shock procedure | Controlled laboratory scenario at VU; everyone received the same unethical request | Neither main condition isolates a manipulated authority variable; response groups are outcomes, not random assignments |
| Obedience measure | Maximum shock level and whether 450 volts was reached | Endorsement without committee reporting | Percentages concern different acts and thresholds, not a common obedience scale |
| Resistance opportunities | Refusal to continue | Refusal and committee reporting; reporting could follow initial compliance | Bocchiaro distinguishes stopping one's own act from challenging a system |
| Authority pressure | Experimenter remained and used ordered prods when resistance occurred | Experimenter left for fixed reflection and task intervals | Bocchiaro tests choices with time alone and an accessible reporting route |
| Additional evidence | Behavioural observations, recordings and post-session accounts | Personality scales, social-value choices, suspicion checks and predictions | Contemporary work tests proposed individual correlates, though measured associations do not establish causes |
Both standardised key features to support reproducibility and observed actual behaviour, reducing reliance on socially desirable declarations. Both also used artificial, deceptive dilemmas. It is more defensible to compare their evidential strengths than to call every laboratory study either wholly valid or wholly invalid.
For example, both observed compliance under a controlled unethical request, but Milgram measured how far a participant progressed through 30 shock levels, whereas Bocchiaro categorised an endorsement, refusal and reporting act. This direct comparison explains a common feature and a specific difference. Two unrelated lists of study details would leave the relationship unstated.
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