EXPERIMENTER: It's absolutely essential that you continue. Please go on.
SUBJECT: [chair scuffles] You know, I'm to the point now I can just feel each one with him. [sigh] The next one is GREEN: grass, hat, ink, apple . . .
The sighs continued and there were long pauses before each following shock was given, but this subject was fully obedient and went on to flip all the switches.
In the initial experiment there were 40 subjects. Many of those who went the whole 450 volts queried the authority in charge, but once they were told they had to, they continued even while expressing discomfort. Some were chillingly obedient. A 37-year-old welder's response was described in detail. He was in a variation of the original experiment where the learner is present and the subject is required to press his hand down onto an electric plate to administer the shock.
The learner, seated alongside him, begs him to stop, but with robotic impassivity, he continues the procedure . . . He relates to the experimenter in a submissive and courteous fashion. At the 330-volt level, the learner refuses not only to touch the shock plate, but also to provide any answers. Annoyed, Batta turns to him and chastises him: 'You better answer and get it over with. We can't stay here all night.' . . . He seems to derive no pleasure from the act itself, only quiet satisfaction at doing his job properly. When he administers 450 volts, he turns to the experimenter and asks: 'Where do we go from here, Professor?' His tone is deferential and expresses his willingness to be a co-operative subject, in contrast to the learner's obstinacy.
In this hands-on variation, Milgram expected one or two subjects, at most, to go on to the final switch. In fact, 12 out of 40 were fully compliant. 'It's a very disturbing sight,' Milgram noted, 'since the victim resists strenuously and emits cries of agony.' In the original experiment with an audible but invisible learner, 26 out of 40 subjects were fully obedient and pressed the 450-volt switch; no subject stopped before 300 volts, the 'intense shock' zone; five refused to go on beyond that point, and 14 defied the experimenter somewhere short of 450 volts.
But it must be just as important to consider the 35 per cent of subjects who did at some point refuse to continue. Early resistance to authority seemed to be the key, Milgram thought. The later they left it to complain, the greater the pressure to rationalize. Two examples of dissent are given in Thomas Blass's book. One man puts his foot down at 135 volts:
EXPERIMENTER: The experiment requires that you go on, teacher. Go on, please.
SUBJECT: But if you don't mind, I'd like to see him myself before I do go on.
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