Prestigious fellowship £50k fund award goes to Dr David Kaposi to “solve” the Milgram enigma and extend work into the theory of implicit violence

Dr David Kaposi has been awarded the prestigious ISRF Mid-Career Fellowship for his project ‘Milgram and beyond: Towards a theory of implicit violence’. The £50k fellowship will enable David to complete his pathbreaking empirical work on Stanley Milgram’s widely known ‘Obedience to authority’ experiments and extend his findings towards a general psychosocial theory of implicit violence.

Dr Kaposi says: “For 60 years, psychologists have been trying to solve the enigma that Milgram’s “obedience to authority” experiments pose: how is it possible that ordinary human beings continue electrocuting an innocent victim just because they are told to do so by a scientist?

“Drawing on archival audio tapes of the original experimental sessions, my research reveals the possible origins of such destructive obedience. Surprisingly, these are not arguments or orders or any other visibly assertive communication. Milgram’s participants tend to quit the experiment when encountering these. But they do appear extremely defenceless against the tiniest of polite phrases or even the smallest of silences.

Dr Kaposi examines these ‘seemingly insignificant’ acts in context:

“Actually, these seemingly insignificant acts are attacking any sign of compassion or moral sense, any small human gesture towards the victim. What makes Milgram’s participants continue is two things. First, in these experiments there is a relentless assault on their humanity. Second, this non-stop assault comes in the banal guise of a polite phrase here or a little silence there. And for this reason, the violence perpetrated on the unwitting participants is not noticeable to anyone concerned. Not even, I think, to the authority himself.

“So, what my research suggests is that we humans may be vulnerable not simply to the violence that hits us in the face, but to a kind of violence we clearly sense but cannot see. We feel it and it has an effect on us, but we cannot do anything about it because we cannot recognise it.”

Dr Kaposi hopes that through the work, the group will gain a better understanding of what happened in Milgram’s lab, and what happens in all kinds of social situations where people are abused, traumatised, or start acting violently.

Professor Paul Stenner, Co-Director, Open Psychology Research Centre, says: “David’s research on Milgram's famous 'obedience' paradigm is opening up fascinating new angles on how power operates within people's interactions.”

Excitement is building for the outcomes of Dr. Kaposi’s research. Prof Peter Hegarty, Co-Director, Open Psychology Research Centre, says: “Since the opening of Stanley Milgram’s archives in the past decade, interest in the meaning of his enduringly fascinating obedience experiments has risen in social psychology and beyond. David has already invited us to see the experiments as a window into the coercive force of experimental situations. We await his next insights form this ISRF fellowship with anticipation.”

Dr Kaposi’s empirical analysis of 140 experimental sessions from Stanley Milgram’s “obedience to authority” series is ongoing and is expected to be concluded by the end of 2021. His ISRF Mid-Career Fellowship commences in August 2021, with empirical findings and theoretical extensions to be completed by mid-2022.