Research On The Bystander Effect

Why should students help pick up fellow classmate's books that he or she dropped? Why should people give to the homeless? Why should humans become organ donors? Altruism is defined as a person's ability to go out of their way to enhance the welfare of someone else without anything in return. But it's not the "what" of altruism that is intriguing, it's the "why" that is truly fascinating. Scientist and researches may never pinpoint what makes humans exhibit altruistic behavior, but there is one thing that scientist and researches are sure about. Altruism plays an important role in running society, and the world can use more of it.

When there is an emergency, why is taking out our phones to take a picture or video the very first thing we want to do? Why do we casually walk by a person who is in trouble, and go about our business as if we did not anyone? Why do we not help or act when someone is getting, but instead we just stand in a crowd and watch? Why do we bury our moral instincts during emergencies? “We witness a problem, consider positive action, and respond by doing nothing. Why do we not help in these situations and put our moral instincts in shackles” (Keltner & Marsh, 2017). We as people are bystanders to the world around us daily, but the question is why? The answer to all the “why” questions is the bystander effect.

The study by Darley and Latane leaves society with the knowledge that everyone who is witnessing an emergency is most likely thinking the same thing “someone else will call for help or has already” so “Always act as if you are the only person there” (Darely & Latane, 1968). The concept of situationism is the driving force behind bystander effect. Situationism is “social behavior is, to a larger extent than people commonly realize, a response to people’s social context, not a function of individual personality” (Fiske, 2010, p. 7). Individuals first have to decide if they are witnessing an emergency. Then they need to decide if they have a responsibility to act which is when situationism comes in. If there are hundreds of witnesses each individual see the situation from a different perspective and responsibility to act is diffused among the crowd. On the other hand if one individual sees an emergency and believes there is no one else to help the responsibility rests on him or her. The context of the situation will determine how an individual will react, but people should consider the reality of everyone believing someone else will react and no one reacting. Kitty Genovese would still be alive if even one person would have called the cops when the first attack started.

Picture this. Someone is on their daily 3.5km run and as they pass the bus stop a woman grabs her chest and collapses. There are crowds of people passing by her but no one’s stopping to help. They probably aren't going to stop and help, because no one is stopping they are going to think if those many people aren’t stopping to help then she is fine, they might also be thinking someone else will help her. Now picture this that same person is out just for a walk around the park and they hear someone cry out for help, no one’s around but them so they probably would go over and help them. These situations are representing the bystander effect. John Darley and Bibb Latane came up with the bystander effect, the bystander effect states that the more people that are present the less likely anyone is to help someone in need. The bystander effect can be connected to the characters in William Golding's Lord of the flies. People just stand by in emergency situations when other people are around, and them no helping the victim can have some serious consequences.

First ‘The Bystander Effect’, states ‘that individuals are less likely to intervene in emergency situations when other people are present’. Latne & Darley, (1970) cited in Byford J.( 2014 pp 232). Simply put, where emergency situations arise, if more than one person is present the likelihood of someone in distress being helped reduces. This is the ‘diffusion of responsibility’ effect were each bystander feels less obliged to help because the responsibility seems to be divided with others present’. (Byford J., 2014 pp233) An example of Bystander Apathy shown within a video (The Open University 2016).

different times) act as if they were is a lot of pain or a drunk. The test was to see how long it took

The bystander effect is defined as the higher the number of people who notice an emergency, the less of a chance that those bystanders will help the victim (as cited in Aronson, Wilson, Akert, & Sommers, 2015). The importance of the bystander effect is unparalleled because it determines whether humans will still help in a situation when there are other people available. Bystanders can deal with situations ranging from the mundane to the dire, but what matters is the number of those who take action.

Hi Shlanda- Thank you for your response! Yes, you are correct in any situation that bystanders are more likely to help because they are dealing with just one individual and a medical condition being present, but when more individuals are already present to help out I can agree with you that most individuals at that point would mind their own business and go on with their

They assured us, they would be among the first to help [in a real emergency]” (Darley and Latane 770). Then Darley and Latane explained why bystanders act the way they do, with their final example. [It involved an individual in a room and a tape recorder playing simulating an individual having major speech difficulties. More individuals, that thought they were alone, came out to help the person having difficulties (the tape recorder). Every time the individual listening to the tape recorder thought that there were more people with them, they were less likely to respond.]

Usually, people know how to help; and sometimes there are individuals who understand how to quickly help hurt shoulders or sprains. Some folks can even make recommendations on how to approach the next week with an injury. I may have observed the bystander effect more in other countries that my family visited when I was younger. Since I have never lived for long periods of time in cities I feel that I have less experience with the bystander effect. However, Milgram's view that we may be managing the information that could flood our minds makes sense.

I have never been in a situation where my actions could prevent someone from being hurt. However, if I were faced with that scenario, I imagine that I would be an active bystander. What I mean by that is I would not ignore them, I would do my best to help that person. Factors that could influence my choice would be the people nearby. If there are others around me that see the situation, I may wait to see if someone else will confront those that are bullying. Or, if I see people who are close to the person being bullied, I may let them handle it instead. However, if no one does anything, I will step up and help. The setting may also influence what I do. For example, if we were in a school and I saw someone being bullied, I would likely

Psychological studies have shown that many bystanders turn away from those in need of aid. This is sometimes because the bystanders assume that someone else will come along to help, however, studies have also suggested deeper reasons to a lack of bystander intervention. Oftentimes, the group of people that you are with have a significant influence on your behaviors and choices, such as whether or not you would intervene to help someone in need. If the person in need of help is within your group, people will often fail to speak up with the intent of protecting the group’s reputation and covering up the situation (Source A). These group mentalities are extremely dangerous and can be very harmful. It’s important that members of a group remember that they are responsible for standing up to attackers, and that they are protected under Good Samaritan laws for their intent to help others in any dangerous

The bystander effect is both a social and psychological phenomenon in which an individual’s inclination towards showing helping behaviours are minimised by the influence of other people. Research has found that the more people acting as bystanders in a situation, the less likely it is that helping behaviours will be demonstrated. However in the correct conditions, where conditioned cues increase self-awareness, it is possible to reverse the bystander effect phenomenon. The bystander effect is prevalent in everyday life, and often decorates the news, shocking the world, especially when authority figures such as police men and women succumb to the effect. Diffusion of responsibility, ignorance of others interpretation of an event and self-consciousness are all social processes which appear to lead to social inhibition of helping behaviours and one of the main theories of the bystander effect is provided Latané and Darley (1970) whose cognitive model provides a series of decisions that can lead to social inhibition. The bystander effect is influenced by the conditions an individual is in when an event occurs, for example the bystander effect appears to be most dominant when an individual is in a group of strangers with low group cohesiveness. FINISH

This may happen for the reason known as “diffusion of responsibility”. Psychologists have proven that people are less likely to intercede in a situation if there are more people present. For example, John Darley and Bibb Latane have done many experiments proving the bystander effect. One experiment is called “The Smoke-Filled Room Experiment” where they take in random person and put a smoke machine in another room. Darley and Latane put more people in the same room that the targeted person is in and turn on the smoke machine. They observe if the targeted person will react if nobody else does. Almost every time the targeted person would look around to see if anybody was doing anything, notice that the others didn’t react, and stay seated knowing that their life could be in danger. Furthermore, people always depend on someone else to make the first decision before following after them. This evidence is proof of the psychological phenomenon of Bystander

Past research has shown that bystander behavior is associated with the processes of not helping; therefore, understanding what factors trigger prosocial behavior may be beneficial in minimizing the bystander effect (Latané & Darley, 1968). The model of helping (notice the event, interpret the need for help, and take personal responsibility) clarifies the stages of cognitive processing that impacts an individual’s decision to intervene (Latané & Darley, 1968). If the bystander fails to notice the event, he will fail to interpret the need for help as well as fail to take responsibility to offer help (Latané & Darley, 1968). Moreover, the arousal: cost-reward model explains how emotional arousal plays an important role in shaping prosocial behavior