International Journal of Coercion, Abuse, and Manipulation Volume 8 2025 2
the instructions from the experimenter anyway. In one
version, according to Milgram’s (1975) description,
[A]t 75 volts, the learner began to grunt and
groan. At 150 volts, he demanded to be let out
of the experiment. At 180 volts, he cried out that
he could no longer stand the pain.
At 300 volts, he ...[insists] he must be
freed (quoted in Stotland &Canon, 1972, 6).
This result supports an emerging central argument
for this analysis. In appropriate circumstances, people
behave in ways inconsistent with their true beliefs and
in ways that they cannot predict, such as when they
procrastinate or show irrational obedience to authority,
as in cults.
Ross (1988, 101-104) argued that this salience
attributed to disobedience is because there is an implicit
psychological contract between the teacher-participant
and the experimenter and that this contract does not
require a valid reason for terminating the shock. Thus,
the participant sees the cost of current disobedience as
very high and can only plan to disobey in the future if the
cost increases. The participant, that is, procrastinates.
Perhaps it is most relevant that the salience is probably
determined not so much by the level of shock the
subject administers but by the difference between the
current voltage and the voltage already administered.
One can see that with a sufficiently slow escalation of
commands, participants can be led to deliver higher
and higher levels of electric shock. They would not
have agreed to administer 450 volts at the start. While
assuming future disobedience, these participants
continue to increase the electric shock needed to
induce them to disobey later, a situation analogous to
cults where members are induced, over time, to act on
behalf of the leader.
The Milgram experiment shows that, when isolated in
a laboratory, individuals may exhibit unexpected and
disturbing behavior out of sheer obedience, powered
by a contract or identification with the experimenter
(Laurens &Ballot, 2021), provided that the demands
progress gradually. Outside the laboratory, in non-
isolated conditions, however, there is evidence that
such behavior occurs only when there is near unanimity
of opinion. In this respect, the most relevant evidence
unpleasant because the “here and now” costs are more
concrete and vivid, as they are immediately unpleasant
compared with vague future costs. This is true even
if the cost of procrastination is very high. Anyone
who decides to diet knows this (Sirois, 2017 Sirois &
Pychil, 2016). Similarly, we adjust our preferences to
desire goods we do not have or cannot easily access.
Elster (1984) used the example of “endogenous change
of preferences.” In one of Hans Christian Andersen’s
novels, a farmer goes to the market to sell or trade his
horse for a profit or something beneficial, but he goes
home with a basket of rotten apples. Along the way, the
farmer had traded the horse for a cow because he liked
it better than the horse, then the cow for a sheep, a
sheep for a goose, a goose for a hen, and finally the hen
for the basket of rotten apples. In other words, people
behave in inconsistent ways that they cannot predict,
indicating that the mind control versus free choice
dichotomy in groups ignores such fluidity in behavior.
In psychology, the relevance a subject or stimuli
assumes concerning a context is called salience. The
salience of an item is its state or quality of standing out
relative to neighboring items. This salience changes
according to the temporal perspective of the viewer
and can produce procrastination or a delay in more
beneficial responses (O’Donoghue &Rabin, 1999, pp.
103-124).
The area in which procrastination is likely to produce the
most damaging results is obedience to undue or abusive
authority, as is typically the case in cults (Singer, 2003).
Nothing explains this better than Milgram’s classic
obedience experiment. Social psychologist Stanley
Milgram (1975) recruited adult men to participate
in an experiment that was supposed to focus on the
effects of punishment on memory. The participants
were routinely assigned the role of teachers, while
an accomplice of the experimenter played the role of
a pupil who had to be punished with electric shocks
when he erred in recalling what was required of him.
The subjects were initially given low-voltage (15 volts)
shocks with doses increasing by 15 volts at a time up to
a maximum of 450. There are several versions of this
experiment, but in all versions, the “pupil” showed a
significant response to the shocks, and most of the time,
the participants revealed afterward that they did not
believe it was right to administer the shock but obeyed
the instructions from the experimenter anyway. In one
version, according to Milgram’s (1975) description,
[A]t 75 volts, the learner began to grunt and
groan. At 150 volts, he demanded to be let out
of the experiment. At 180 volts, he cried out that
he could no longer stand the pain.
At 300 volts, he ...[insists] he must be
freed (quoted in Stotland &Canon, 1972, 6).
This result supports an emerging central argument
for this analysis. In appropriate circumstances, people
behave in ways inconsistent with their true beliefs and
in ways that they cannot predict, such as when they
procrastinate or show irrational obedience to authority,
as in cults.
Ross (1988, 101-104) argued that this salience
attributed to disobedience is because there is an implicit
psychological contract between the teacher-participant
and the experimenter and that this contract does not
require a valid reason for terminating the shock. Thus,
the participant sees the cost of current disobedience as
very high and can only plan to disobey in the future if the
cost increases. The participant, that is, procrastinates.
Perhaps it is most relevant that the salience is probably
determined not so much by the level of shock the
subject administers but by the difference between the
current voltage and the voltage already administered.
One can see that with a sufficiently slow escalation of
commands, participants can be led to deliver higher
and higher levels of electric shock. They would not
have agreed to administer 450 volts at the start. While
assuming future disobedience, these participants
continue to increase the electric shock needed to
induce them to disobey later, a situation analogous to
cults where members are induced, over time, to act on
behalf of the leader.
The Milgram experiment shows that, when isolated in
a laboratory, individuals may exhibit unexpected and
disturbing behavior out of sheer obedience, powered
by a contract or identification with the experimenter
(Laurens &Ballot, 2021), provided that the demands
progress gradually. Outside the laboratory, in non-
isolated conditions, however, there is evidence that
such behavior occurs only when there is near unanimity
of opinion. In this respect, the most relevant evidence
unpleasant because the “here and now” costs are more
concrete and vivid, as they are immediately unpleasant
compared with vague future costs. This is true even
if the cost of procrastination is very high. Anyone
who decides to diet knows this (Sirois, 2017 Sirois &
Pychil, 2016). Similarly, we adjust our preferences to
desire goods we do not have or cannot easily access.
Elster (1984) used the example of “endogenous change
of preferences.” In one of Hans Christian Andersen’s
novels, a farmer goes to the market to sell or trade his
horse for a profit or something beneficial, but he goes
home with a basket of rotten apples. Along the way, the
farmer had traded the horse for a cow because he liked
it better than the horse, then the cow for a sheep, a
sheep for a goose, a goose for a hen, and finally the hen
for the basket of rotten apples. In other words, people
behave in inconsistent ways that they cannot predict,
indicating that the mind control versus free choice
dichotomy in groups ignores such fluidity in behavior.
In psychology, the relevance a subject or stimuli
assumes concerning a context is called salience. The
salience of an item is its state or quality of standing out
relative to neighboring items. This salience changes
according to the temporal perspective of the viewer
and can produce procrastination or a delay in more
beneficial responses (O’Donoghue &Rabin, 1999, pp.
103-124).
The area in which procrastination is likely to produce the
most damaging results is obedience to undue or abusive
authority, as is typically the case in cults (Singer, 2003).
Nothing explains this better than Milgram’s classic
obedience experiment. Social psychologist Stanley
Milgram (1975) recruited adult men to participate
in an experiment that was supposed to focus on the
effects of punishment on memory. The participants
were routinely assigned the role of teachers, while
an accomplice of the experimenter played the role of
a pupil who had to be punished with electric shocks
when he erred in recalling what was required of him.
The subjects were initially given low-voltage (15 volts)
shocks with doses increasing by 15 volts at a time up to
a maximum of 450. There are several versions of this
experiment, but in all versions, the “pupil” showed a
significant response to the shocks, and most of the time,
the participants revealed afterward that they did not
believe it was right to administer the shock but obeyed
