The Milgram Expirement

The Milgram experiment is very popular, and well known. Even though you may have never heard the name before chances are that you have probably heard or read about the experiment itself. The purpose was to see to what point regular people would obey a figure of authorities command even though it is against their consciousness. In the experiment a man in a white lab coat (the figure of authority) instructed a volunteer to ask another man who he also thinks is also a volunteer (actually an actor) questions. The first time the actor gets a question wrong the volunteer has to press a button in front of him and shock the actor, who is in another room, with 15 volts (because he is an actor he pretends to be shocked every time the button is pressed, but the volunteer thinks it’s real). The buttons in front of the volunteer range from 15 volts to 450 volts, which is considered deadly. As the volunteer makes his way down the buttons, and increasing the voltage the actor screams louder and louder and begs for the volunteer to stop, but the man in the white lab coat keeps saying the same phrases: “Please continue”, “The experiment requires that you continue”, “It is absolutely essential that you continue”, “you have no other choice, you must go on”. Because the man looks like a figure of authority most volunteers go on. Around the 300 volt mark the actor stops screaming and makes no noise at all to make the volunteer believe he is in danger. As a result, out of 40 people, 26 worked all the way down to 450 volts, which is considered deadly, even after the actor stopped making noise. The video below is reproduction of the milgram experiment, not the original.