In the 1960s, Yale University psychology professor Stanley Milgram conducted what is now famously known as the “Milgram Experiment” to study the degree to which people will obey authority—even if that means going against one’s better judgment and good conscious.

Jaclyn Jaeger is a freelance contributor to Compliance Week after working for the company for 15 years. She writes on a wide variety of topics, including ethics and compliance, risk management, legal,...