Psychological significance

In 1963 Stanley Milgram conducted an obedience study that re-evaluated the psychological ethics code.
Although the study was widely criticized, the findings are still important today. The study consisted of 
forcing participants to shock, what they thought were, innocent participants. Milgam would not let the
 participants stop the shocking, no matter how much the receiver screams and begs them to stop.  
Participants would continue to shock all the way to the highest voltage, simply because Milgram told 
them to. This suggests that obedience is a strong factor and would make people do things they wouldn’t 
normally do.

This study has been connected to and explained many historical events, for example, the holocaust. Many 
could not believe that the Nazis would do what they did and people claim that they themselves would 
never do something like that.  Hitler, however, was similar to Milgram in the experiment. Obedience has 
the power to make people do things that they would not normally do, which can explain the Nazis actions.

Information for Foreigners was written in 1971, 8 years after the Milgram study. The play taps into 
the Milgram themes because the guides act as people of authority to the audience members.  Even 
though the scenes that the audience members are seeing are disturbing and wrong, the guides acting 
as though it’s okay somehow makes it okay to the audience. The guide even tells the audience to clap 
at the end and they do so, even after what they just watched.