Abstract

ABSTRACTRecent research suggests that obedience in the Milgram paradigm is underpinned by stress vulnerability and inhibitory control over pain sharing. Because self-regulatory fatigue induction is a suited method to investigate the influence of inhibitory control on behaviour, participants were randomly assigned to a High vs. Low self-regulatory condition. Heart rate variability was collected during 5-min baseline and continuously during the experimental procedure. Prior to the experiment, participants completed an online survey assessing right-wing authoritarianism, a well-known predictor of obedience. Using the Immersive Video Milgram Obedience Experiment, we found that lower resting HRV predicted higher destructive obedience, that low self-regulatory inhibition reduced destructive obedience, that the well-established influence of RWA on destructive obedience was suppressed in the presence of SRF. Implic...