8/24/2020

 http://www.apa.org/career
s/resources/guides/careers.
aspx#

Careers in  This is a great reference

Psychology
 American Psychological
Association
 Become a member!

Authority
Appeals to Blind Obedience

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 The power to determine, adjudicate, or

otherwise settle issues or disputes,
jurisdiction, the right to control,
command, or determine

Authority 


A power or right delegated or given
A person or body of persons in whom
authority is vested

Holocaust:
1933-1945

 6 Million Jews Killed

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Stanley
Milgram
 Rather than ask how
the Nazis could be so
different from us,
Milgram thought
outside of the box, and
asked instead how are
we a little like the
Nazis
 Performed his famous
obedience study

 Participants were asked to draw

straws to see who would be the
teacher and who would be the
Milgram’s learner
The learner is supposed to
Obedience 
remember which words go
together form a list of words
Study otherwise he will be shocked
 You receive a shock of 45-volts
just to see what if feels like

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 Before going into the other room,

the learner mentions he has a
Milgram’s heart condition and asks if the
shock poses any threat
Obedience  Experimenter: “Although shocks
will be painful, they will cause no
Study permanent tissue damage”

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Voltages

Moderate Shock Danger: Severe Shock

15 Volts 225 Volts 450 Volts

Slight Shock XXX

• You proceed, until the learner screams

out in pain
• You turn to the experimenter and his
responses are:
–

–
“Please go on”
“The experiment requires that you
Milgram’s
continue”
Study
– “You have no choice, you must go on”
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fC
VlI-_4GZQ

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What
Psychiatrists
believed:
• 1 in 1,000 people will
proceed to the highest
voltage
• Only the true sadists
• Results:
– 65% of teachers fully
obeyed
– Those who disobeyed
almost always made it to
330 volts

– THESE RESULTS ARE

SHOCKING!

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 Perceived legitimacy of the authority Three

(Experimenter from Yale in a white lab
coat) Important
 The proximity of the authority to the
figure
Factors of
 Was the teacher’s emotional distance Milgram’s
to the learner
Study

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Stanford Prison
Experiment

• Phillip Zimbardo performed

experiment in 1971 at
Stanford University
• Participants were told it
was a two-week mock
prison experiment
• Participants received $15 a
day
• Took place in the basement
of the psychology building
• Some participants
randomly assigned to be
prisoners, others assigned
to be guards

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Prison Experiment

 Was supposed to last for two weeks

 Abruptly ended after 6 days

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0jYx8
nwjFQ – Original Study
 http://www.ted.com/talks/philip_zimbard
o_on_the_psychology_of_evil#t-291431
 Ted Talk – Skip from 5:00 minutes to
6:45

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 Learn to distinguish
When between:
 Legitimate authority, based
Should We on true expertise
Illegitimate authority,
Obey?

based only on the
experience of expertise

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Nurse Studies

 Ear drops in the wrong place

 “Ear drops in R ear”

 Killer nurses
 To high of a dose!!
 95% of the nurses arrived at the patient’s
room fully ready to administer the shot

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• Proponents suggest that any belief that

has been held for a long time must be
valid
Sexism?
“Ancient
–

– Racism?
– Acupuncture? Wisdom”
•
– Blood letting?
Social progress relies on the continual
fallacy
questioning of ancient wisdom, and
there is no reason to exempt any belief
system from such challenge

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 Overestimate the extent to which

others subscribe to a given belief
 Social Proof: the idea that the
suggestion of many people in
agreement lends at least a superficial
aura of legitimacy to authoritative
claims “Popularity”
 Example from book: When people
repeat the claim that “one in three
Fallacy
Americans uses alternative medicine,”
you should recognize the deceptive
disconnect between the message and
the data
 BUT WHY????

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 One in Three people use

alternative medication is a
bogus appeal to authority
based on exaggerated
popularity
“Popularity”  Only 1% used acupuncture
Fallacy  Only 3% used herbs
 Only 1.33% actually
consulted a practitioner

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 Popularity fallacy
 Most people approve of X (or have
favorable emotions toward X)
 Therefore X is true
 Examples:
 If you were beautiful, you could live like
this, so buy Buty-EZ and become
beautiful. (Here, the appeal is to the
Another

"beautiful people".)
Polls suggest that the Liberals will form a way to
majority government, so you may as well


vote for them.
Everyone knows that the Earth is flat, so
look at it:
why do you persist in your outlandish
claims?
 Humans cannot survive at speeds of 25
mph or greater

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• Professional was an expert in her field

of education
• Said that teaching styles should match
students style of learner (Ex. Visual
“Self-
learner has teacher that uses lots of
visual aids)
Proclaimed
• No research had been done to see if Expertise”
this were true, people were just taking
the experts word for it Fallacy
• Expert status does not guarantee
actuality or truth!!!

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Myths in Psychology

 #18 – Students learn best when teaching styles are

matched to their learning styles
 Learning style research is flying “under the radar”
bypassing anonymous critical feedback by expert scholars
 No agreement on the definition of learning styles across
the literature

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 According to Ruscio:
 “Expertise derives not from opinion,
not even from the consensual
agreement of an entire profession, but
from a demonstrated ability to
contribute valid judgments and reach
accurate conclusions” (p 61). What is
 A lot of commercials or infomercials
use Doctors to back their product in expertise?
order to appeal to expertise
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7z
T4m0MYjA

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Central
 Petty and Cacioppo (1981) suggested
that there are two different ways or and
routes to persuasion:
 Central Route
Peripheral
 Peripheral Route Route to
Persuasion

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 The central route to persuasion

involves being persuaded by the
arguments or the content of the
message
Central
 For example:
 after hearing a political debate you may Route
decide to vote for a candidate because
you found the candidates views and
arguments very convincing

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• The peripheral route to persuasion

involves being persuaded in a manner
that is not based on the arguments or
the message content
• For example:
– After reading a political debate you Peripheral
Route
may decide to vote for a candidate
because you like the sound of the
person's voice, or the person went to
the same university as you did
– The peripheral route can involve using
superficial cues such as the
attractiveness of the speaker

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Who would
you listen to?

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