ABSTRACT
Within social psychology, obedience has been studied as the social phenomenon that enables an individual to perform actions when instructed to do so by someone else, and which they would not consider when acting independently. Its study was largely initiated by an attempt to understand the behaviour of German troops and civilians during the Second World War and was given an impetus by the work of Milgram. His study of obedience shows how the demand characteristics of a situation appear to enable people to suspend their own conscience, and to perceive themselves as having had no option but to obey. See also autonomous state, implacable experimenter.
