RESEARCH METHODS & OBEDIENCE

Research Methods & Obedience

Research Methods & Obedience

Milgram's research was controversial, in part because of the stress it put on his subjects. Many psychologists raised the issue of research ethics in connection with Milgram's research, arguing that it was not acceptable to put subjects through this kind of experience. Milgram (1963) himself made it sound as if participation in his experiment could be traumatic. He quoted a person who observed his experiment:

I observed a mature and initially poised businessman enter the laboratory smiling and confident. Within 20 minutes he was reduced to a twitching, stuttering wreck who was rapidly ...