A Virtual Reprise of the Stanley Milgram Obedience Experiments

Abstract

BackgroundStanley Milgram's 1960s experimental findings that people would administer apparently lethal electric shocks to a stranger at the behest of an authority figure remain critical for understanding obedience. Yet, due to the ethical controversy that his experiments ignited, it is nowadays impossible to carry out direct experimental studies in this area. In the study reported in this paper, we have used a similar paradigm to the one used by Milgram within an immersive virtual environment. Our objective has not been the study of obedience in itself, but of the extent to which participants would respond to such an extreme social situation as if it were real in spite of their knowledge that no real events were taking place.MethodologyFollowing the style of the original experiments, the participants were invited to administer a series of word association memory tests to the (female) virtual human representing the stranger. When she gave an incorrect answer, the participants were instructed to administer an ‘electric shock’ to her, increasing the voltage each time. She responded with increasing discomfort and protests, eventually demanding termination of the experiment. Of the 34 participants, 23 saw and heard the virtual human, and 11 communicated with her only through a text interface.ConclusionsOur results show that in spite of the fact that all participants knew for sure that neither the stranger nor the shocks were real, the participants who saw and heard her tended to respond to the situation at the subjective, behavioural and physiological levels as if it were real. This result reopens the door to direct empirical studies of obedience and related extreme social situations, an area of research that is otherwise not open to experimental study for ethical reasons, through the employment of virtual environments.

Just a Game? Unjustified Virtual Violence Produces Guilt in Empathetic Players

“…Although not directly tested, users may have felt spontaneously guilty independent of their awareness that the depicted violence was not real. Such a notion is speculative, but corresponds to a growing amount of research indicating that users automatically respond to virtual environments to a certain extent as though they were real (Bailenson, Blascovich, Beall & Loomis, 2003;McCall et al, 2009;Nass & Moon, 2000;Slater et al, 2006;Weber, Ritterfeld, & Mathiak, 2006;Yee, Bailenson, & Ducheneaut, 2009). Bailenson et al (2003) argue that users respond to real and virtual settings in a similar way only in terms of their automatic responses, yet distinguish between real and virtual settings when utilizing consciously controlled processes.…”

“…Results showed that White participants shot armed African American soldiers more quickly than White soldiers, suggesting that the ethnicity of the virtual characters activated participants' stereotypes. A later study by Slater et al (2006) replicated the Milgram obedience experiment in a virtual setting. Participants followed orders to give lethal electric shocks to a virtual stranger.…”

Why and how to use virtual reality to study human social interaction: The challenges of exploring a new research landscape

“…For instance, to test participant's fear responses, VR was used to create a ‘room 101’ with disturbing events such as spiders crawling around, explosions, and a floor collapsing (McCall et al ., 2015). Studies from the Slater group include a recreation of the famous Milgram experiment where participants had to execute fatal electric shots to a virtual character (Slater et al ., 2006); a violent fight scenario (Slater et al ., 2013) and a moral dilemma with an active shooter (Pan & Slater, 2011). In the latter, participants thought their task was to operate a lift in a gallery in VR, but later were shocked to be confronted with a tough decision: A gunman entered the lift and started shooting, and within a few seconds they had to choose whether they should push a button to save five people but sacrificing one other, who would otherwise be fine.…”

Creating Virtual Characters

“…In front of them they could see an audience composed of a small number of animated virtual characters. [14], the London underground [2], the Milgram recreation [16], the virtual bar [11], the socially anxious virtual character [12] and the medical consultation [13].…”