Scenario D

This study will replicate and extend research by Milgram on the conditions under which adults will administer painful or potentially lethal punishment to a victim in obedience to the instructions of an authority figure. It is vital that we understand the conditions under which people will and will not carry out instructions leading to inhumane acts so that adequate legal and social safeguards against the abuse of authority may be instituted without delay. In this study, male and female subjects will be asked to be "teacher" in a study of the effects of punishment on learning. A fluffy, attractive puppy in a cage with an electrifiable grid floor will be presented as the learner attempting to learn to discriminate steady lights from flickering lights. The subject's task is to administer a series of increasingly intense shocks to the puppy, increasing the shock after each error. In fact, the shocks the puppy experience will be restricted to levels insufficiently intense to produce tissue damage. For half of the subjects of each sex, a small amount of anesthetic gas will be introduced into the dog's cage so that the animal appears to slump into unresponsiveness as a result of the shocks.