blog #14

This week in psych we discussed how authority can have an effect on how people act and do things. Just being told that someone else in higher then everyone else, makes those people feel that they need to fallow the directions even to them. Most of the time it doesn't matter what they are being told to do or how hurtful in can be to some people. If they are being told to do something they will do it because they don't want to get in trouble. I think that having people in charge can be a good thing, but it can also be a bad thing.

In the video that we watch this week in class it showed "teachers" being told to if an electric shock to "students" when they get a question wrong. The teachers were being told to increase the shock every time. They were testing to see how long they would keep the experiment going and to see if they would stand up to the leader. Most people continued the experiment until the very end and only a few stood up and wouldn't finish. At the end of the experiment they were told that there really wasn't any "students" being shocked. I think that if they really was "students" being shocked that they would be an example of how obedience to authority could be an extremely bad or harmful thing.

On the other side obedience to authority can an extremely good thing. I think that to accomplish a project or to get things done there would have to be a person in charge to oversee what is going on and make sure that everything gets done. If that person wasn't there, it would be hard for things to get done and take longer. Teachers and bosses re another good example of why we need authority in schools and at work. Authority can be helpful and rewarding, but it can also have a bad side and not be so wonderful.