Milgram's Agency Theory (AQA GCSE Psychology)

The agentic state & the autonomous state

• Stanley Milgram is one of the most well-known psychology researchers worldwide due to his groundbreaking study on obedience 

• Milgram’s work on obedience drew from the idea that people will show obedience if specific situational factors are present, even to the point of harming a complete stranger who has done them no harm (known as destructive obedience)

Agentic state

• Milgram’s study was based on the concept of agency theory

  • When an individual is in an agentic state they feel removed from their own actions - they are acting on behalf of a higher authority i.e. ‘just obeying orders’

• Examples of being in an agentic state are:

  • Opening fire on unarmed civilians because your commander issued the order to do so

  • Reporting on your colleagues for making personal calls during office hours as part of your workplace’s ‘incentive’ to boost productivity

  • ‘Ghosting’ one of your friends because the most popular and powerful person in your group told you to do so

• Being in the agentic state allows people to lessen any feelings of responsibility or guilt about their (negative) actions because they are acting under someone else’s authority, the consequences cannot be theirs i.e. ‘not my fault, not my problem’

Autonomous state

• Being in an autonomous state is the opposite of the above

  • You yourself take responsibility for your actions, you are not going to relinquish agency to a higher authority figure

• Examples of being in an autonomous state are:

  • Refusing to follow your commander’s orders as to do so would be to commit an atrocity

  • Not participating in your workplace’s ‘incentive’ to boost productivity as it involves betraying colleagues

  • Continuing to talk to one of your friends even though the most popular and powerful person in your group told you to ‘ghost’ them

• Maintaining an autonomous state is not easy, particularly when the consequences of doing so could be dire e.g. you may get the sack, you may put yourself in mortal danger, you may be ostracised from your group

• Blass & Schmitt (2000) agreed that the person responsible for harming the ‘learner’ in Milgram’s study was the experimenter rather than the participant (the ‘teacher’), hence they acknowledged that being in an agentic state takes responsibility away from the individual

Agentic state diagram

Soldiers fighting in the Vietnam war may have succumbed to the agentic state.

Authority & culture

• An authority figure is anyone who has a legitimate status to issue orders

  • ‘Legitimate’ could be considered in official terms e.g. police officer or unofficially e.g. school bully

• If an individual perceives someone to be an authority figure then they are much more likely to obey orders from them than from someone who appears to lack status or authority

• Research by Bickman (1974) showed that people were more likely to obey a confederate dressed as a security guard than a milkman or a man in plain clothes (this condition resulted in the lowest levels of obedience), hence a uniform confers authority, even when it is not a police uniform

• Obedience towards authority figures is something that is culturally transmitted i.e. it is taught, both directly and indirectly, via the cultural and societal norms as part of someone’s upbringing

• Most cultures operate a social hierarchy in which authority figures occupy the highest positions and expect to be obeyed

• Lack of obedience may result in punishment or the withdrawal of social approval and acceptance e.g. prison, expulsion from school

Proximity

• Proximity refers to how near/far someone or something is to you i.e. the distance between you

• Destructive obedience is more easily achieved if the person/people you are harming are out of sight (i.e. out of mind)

  • If you have an ‘up close and personal’ view of the person you are harming then it is likely that you will feel uncomfortable, upset, awkward, distressed etc.

  • If you were a participant in Milgram’s study, giving a stranger electric shocks it would be far more difficult for you to proceed up to 450 volts if that person was sitting across from you in the same room rather than being in another room where you can’t see them

• The closer someone is to you, the more difficult it is to follow orders to harm them

  • Milgram termed this feeling of discomfort moral strain i.e. you know that you should not be following destructive orders yet you do so anyway, the result being guilt, distress, anxiety

• Obedience decreases as proximity increases (and vice versa)

Milgram's proximity diagram

Milgram’s ‘proximity’ variation resulted in lower levels of obedience than his original ‘remote’ victim study.

Evaluation of Milgram’s agency theory

Strengths

• Milgram’s agency theory is backed up by research support e.g. Hofling (1966) found that nurses were prepared to administer an overdose of a drug to their patient if instructed to do so by a doctor

• Milgram’s theory has external validity as examples of agency theory and destructive obedience to an authority figure can be seen in acts of atrocity such as the holocaust

Weaknesses 

• Milgram’s theory does not explain why it is that some people resist the orders of authority figures and do not obey, even when doing so could mean that they put themselves in danger

• Milgram’s theory is deterministic as it implies that those who commit acts of destructive obedience have no control over their actions, which reduces their free will and, ultimately, their responsibility for these acts