The Psychological Phenomenon Of The Bystander Effect

On March 13th, 1964, in New York, a young woman by the name of Catherine “Kitty” Genovese was just coming home from her late shift at work. It’s three a.m., and as she’s walking to her apartment building, she notices a suspicious, hooded man some distance away. Rightfully concerned, she goes to the phone booth, aiming to call the police, but never makes it in time. She’s stabbed in the back, and then in her gut. When her screams cause the neighbors to turn the lights on, all they do

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.

John Darley and Bibb Latane (1969) are two psychologists who studied and created the idea of the bystander effect in which can be defined

“What hurts the victim most is not the cruelty of the oppressor, but the silence of the bystander.” -Elie Wiesel

Social psychology first examined the phenomena later termed “bystander effect” in response to a 1964 murder. The murder of a young woman with as many as 38 witnesses and none who helped until it was too late. The bystander effect is individuals seeing an emergency situation but not helping. There are many reasons why individuals do not respond: diffusion of responsibility, not noticing or unsure if it is an emergency, and not wanting to be liable if the person still dies are a few.

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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).

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.

this brutal murder and not one of them informed the police? The bystander effect states that, in

Cherry, F. (1995) cited in Burr, V. chapter eight Bystander intervention in Critical Readings in Social Psychology second edition (2012) Landridge, D. Taylor, S. and Mahendran, K. The Open University Walton Hall Milton Keynes

Article While attending GoodLife Fitness gym, actress and Toronto native Alex Jade saved the life of a fellow gym-goer when he went into cardiac arrest. Jade, who had prior training in cardiopulmonary resuscitation, jumped to action when onlookers and employees did not. After the events, she reported how one employee, unbothered by the events taking place, strolled over to the victim, placed the defibrillator beside the him and stepped away. This prompted Jade to take action. The actress ran over, utilized the defibrillator and CPR methods until emergency responders reached the gym and took the man to the hospital to perform surgery.

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

The bystander effect is a social psychological phenomenon that concerns the behavior of individuals that, facing an emergency situation in which another person is subject to violence or needs help, do not intervene if other people are present. The effect has been tested in the laboratory by John Darley and Bibb Latané (1968) after the murder of Kitty Genovese, stabbed to death by a maniac under the neighborhood’s eyes while she was walking home from her work at 3p.m. She asked for help for half an hour before she died, but the bystanders simply did not. Social psychologists tried to explain the bystanders’ behavior, focusing their explanation on two factors. According to the social influence principles, in an emergency situation, it has been assumed that bystanders monitor the behavior of other people to decide how to react. When nobody is doing anything, other bystanders tend to assume that help is not needed. Moreover, the diffusion of responsibility appears to play a role in this phenomenon. In this case, people feel less guilty if the guilt of their inaction can be shared with other bystanders (Levine & Crowther, 2008).

Students taking part in the study thought they were taking part in a marketing study for a game. When the receptionist greeted the participants she informed them she would be next door while they signed the questionnaires. The receptionist produced much noise as possible in order for the participants to hear her; she shuffled paper and slammed drawers. Out of nowhere a big collapse was heard, which resulted in her screaming asking for help. Those who were in a condition with others were less helpful than when participants were alone. Participants blamed inhibition for not helping because others would not show any action. The behaviors of others influence one’s own behavior in the process of deciding to help or not. People are more influenced by others than what they think. This can be a negative factor as society acts on others actions it can make people become passive. The presence of others tends to decrease responding to a situation. Those who are alone are rated hire to respond to a situation compared to those who are in a group (Shotland & Heinold, 1985).When other bystanders are aware of one another the bystander group results in no help at all towards the victim.