A Level Psychology OCR Practice Exam

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Prepare for the A Level Psychology Exam with our quiz. Access flashcards, multiple choice questions, and detailed explanations to enhance your study experience and boost your confidence.

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What did Milgram's experiment primarily contribute to the understanding of?

The effects of groupthink on decision making
The nature of compliance and obedience to authority
How empathy affects judgment
The impact of punishment on learning

The correct answer is: The nature of compliance and obedience to authority

Milgram's experiment primarily contributed to the understanding of the nature of compliance and obedience to authority. Conducted in the early 1960s, this study aimed to explore how far individuals would go in following instructions from an authority figure, even when those instructions conflicted with their personal conscience and morals. The findings showed that a significant percentage of participants were willing to administer what they believed to be painful electric shocks to another person simply because they received orders from an experimenter in a lab coat. This demonstrated the powerful influence that authority figures can exert on individual behavior, leading people to act in ways that they might not consider acceptable under normal circumstances. Milgram’s work raised important ethical questions about psychological experimentation, but it also provided crucial insights into the dynamics of human behavior and authority, contributing to fields such as social psychology and understanding authoritarianism. In contrast, the other options focus on different psychological phenomena that do not reflect the core findings of Milgram's research.