Authority Knows No Gender – Gender Effects in Exerting Obedience in Milgram’s Experiment

Abstract: Previous studies employing Milgram’s paradigm have reported no gender differences between “learners” and “teachers” in the administration and receipt of punishment. However, the potential influence of the experimenter’s gender on obedience remains underexplored. To address this gap, we conducted two studies. Study 1 was a laboratory experiment ( N = 80) using the obedience lite paradigm. The results revealed no significant effect of the experimenter’s gender on compliance rates: 88% of participants complied with a female experimenter, compared to 90% with a male experimenter. Study 2 was an online experiment ( N = 793) in which participants were asked to imagine receiving instructions from either a male or female professor to administer electric shocks. As in the laboratory study, the imagined gender of the authority figure had no significant impact on participants' reported willingness to obey. Across both studies, obedience levels were statistically equivalent regardless of the experimenter’s gender. These findings suggest that gender does not meaningfully influence obedience – whether in actual or hypothetical contexts – thus enriching our understanding of the gender dynamics underlying responses to authority.