A new, modified experiment derived from an old, psychological one from the 1960s reveals how humans lose control or a sense "ownership" over their actions when they are obeying orders, showing how individuals or groups can be forced to do something.

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This milder version of the Milgram Experiment was recently conducted by researchers to demonstrate how the subjects gain a sense of mental distance from their actions especially when they are "just obeying orders". This then results in a feeling of lesser responsibility over their actions, especially when people are ordered to do something good or bad.

During a 1963 study led by Stanley Milgram at Yale University, the subjects were ordered to carry out electric shocks to another person if that person failed to provide the right answer. This person, unknown to the subjects, just pretended to respond to this electric shock punishment. Apparently, a huge number of subjects did not question when they are ordered to deliver shocks from an authority figure, despite seeing the "painful" reactions of the "victim" who supposedly gave the wrong answers.   

In this new study, researchers from the University College London conducted a new, modified Milgram experiment, revealing how the subjects became distant or disconnected with their actions upon obeying orders.

According to lead author of the study, Patrick Haggard from the University College London, the team was eager to find out how people felt about the action that they were ordered to do, including the outcome of their actions. This kind of "time perception" says something about how people experience their actions, and not just about what they expect to feel after their actions.   

The results also show that when the subjects were given freedom of choice for the action following an order, there was a longer pause between the action and tone which are both produced when the subjects administered an electric shock by pressing a key.

Subjects were also asked to report in milliseconds about the duration of the interval between the key press and tone. This interval ranges from 200, 500 and 800 milliseconds that allowed the team to determine the participants' sense of ownership to their actions or responsibility over the outcome of their actions.

The results also say that the longer the time, the lesser responsibility that the subject feels. This also demonstrates how the subjects are losing control over the results of their actions when they were ordered to act versus their own decision.

According to co-author of the study Emilie Caspar of the Université Libre de Bruxelles, this distance of feeling responsible for what one has done reveals a lot, where many people appear to obey orders such as in Milgram's experiments.

Earlier experiments were notoriously known especially during the Nuremberg trials, as Nazi defendants claim that they were only merely following orders.

In this new study, the team believes that these findings can possess great social relevance especially in warfare and or national defense acts, leading to better management of distributing responsibility to authorities.

This new study is published in the journal, Current Biology.