This experiment was conducted in 1961 by psychologist Stanley Milgram, and was designed to measure the lengths that people would go to in obedience to authority figures, even if the acts they were instructed to carry out were clearly harmful to others.

Subjects were told to play the role of teacher and administer electric shocks to the learner, an actor who was out of sight and ostensibly in another room, every time they answered a question incorrectly. In reality, no one was actually being shocked. The learner, purposely answering questions wrongly, was made to sound like they were in a great deal of pain as the intensity of the shocks increased with each incorrect answer. Despite these protests many subjects continued to administer shocks when an authority figure, the 'experimenter,' urged them to. Eventually, 65% of subjects administered what would be lethal electric shocks, the highest level of 450 volts.

The results showed that ordinary people are likely to follow orders given by an authority figure, even to the extent of killing an innocent human being. Obedience to authority is simply ingrained in us all, from the way we are brought up as children.