My guess is still that sadism did not play any large role; but I haven’t read the linked article (just skimmed parts) and for this and other reasons am not sure. Are there others here who have looked and updated one way or another?
I read Milgram’s book in high school after I got it from a library booksale (which included many variations on the most famous experiment, and results in which folks were e.g. noticably less obedient when the lab looked less official, and quite a bit more obedient when they needed only to read the questions while a “fellow experimental subject” (confederate) administered the shocks, lots showing many signs of distress, etc., and I didn’t notice anything in it that suggested sadism to me at the time. Though this isn’t too much evidence. Part of where I’m coming from is that Milgram’s book seemed to me like a person trying honestly to understand something, which is a bar most psychology experiments do not rise to IMO; and I don’t know the new study authors and don’t have any more-than-baseline trust in them.
Two off the top of my head possible confounders for the evidence described in the OP, about following procedures less well among those who went along:
a) Maybe those who are more literate and capable of following procedures exactly are also more willing and able to stop following procedures;
b) Maybe some subjects had relatively good internal communication/cooperation between the bits of them that cared about obedience and the bits that cared about the other subject, such that they could quiet their mind enough to follow instructions well while they were following them, and could also quit after awhile. And others had a loud “internal dissonance” thing that made them bad at both following instructions during the screaming, and quitting.
In support of (b): the linked paper mentions that both “did the shocks to the end” participants, and “eventually disobeyed” participants followed the procedure more exactly during the initial phase of the experiment where the shocks are small and the “learner” isn’t protesting. Also, if it’s framed as “participants who listened to the screams before continuing their instructions were more likely to eventually refuse to give shocks than were those who read instructions over the screams”, I dunno, it sounds less to me like sadism and more like letting info in?
There is however also the fact that I would not have predicted Milgram’s experiments (neither when I first heard them, nor, probably, now if I’d had the rest of my life-experiences but not heard of his study), which is evidence I might be getting this wrong.
My guess is still that sadism did not play any large role; but I haven’t read the linked article (just skimmed parts) and for this and other reasons am not sure. Are there others here who have looked and updated one way or another?
I read Milgram’s book in high school after I got it from a library booksale (which included many variations on the most famous experiment, and results in which folks were e.g. noticably less obedient when the lab looked less official, and quite a bit more obedient when they needed only to read the questions while a “fellow experimental subject” (confederate) administered the shocks, lots showing many signs of distress, etc., and I didn’t notice anything in it that suggested sadism to me at the time. Though this isn’t too much evidence. Part of where I’m coming from is that Milgram’s book seemed to me like a person trying honestly to understand something, which is a bar most psychology experiments do not rise to IMO; and I don’t know the new study authors and don’t have any more-than-baseline trust in them.
Two off the top of my head possible confounders for the evidence described in the OP, about following procedures less well among those who went along:
a) Maybe those who are more literate and capable of following procedures exactly are also more willing and able to stop following procedures;
b) Maybe some subjects had relatively good internal communication/cooperation between the bits of them that cared about obedience and the bits that cared about the other subject, such that they could quiet their mind enough to follow instructions well while they were following them, and could also quit after awhile. And others had a loud “internal dissonance” thing that made them bad at both following instructions during the screaming, and quitting.
In support of (b): the linked paper mentions that both “did the shocks to the end” participants, and “eventually disobeyed” participants followed the procedure more exactly during the initial phase of the experiment where the shocks are small and the “learner” isn’t protesting. Also, if it’s framed as “participants who listened to the screams before continuing their instructions were more likely to eventually refuse to give shocks than were those who read instructions over the screams”, I dunno, it sounds less to me like sadism and more like letting info in?
There is however also the fact that I would not have predicted Milgram’s experiments (neither when I first heard them, nor, probably, now if I’d had the rest of my life-experiences but not heard of his study), which is evidence I might be getting this wrong.