Subjects overheard an epileptic seizure. The subjects either believed they were alone of they were part of a group with one to four other unseen individuals. Darley and Latane predicted that the presence of bystanders would reduce the feelings of personal responsibility resulting in a lowered speed of reporting. There no significant difference in speed between men and women. Personality and background did not play a role is reporting. This experiment suggests that inaction is influenced more by bystander’s response to other observers rather than indifference to the victim.
Introduction
In 1964, a serial rapist and murderer stabbed Kitty Genovese to death. The attack occurred in the middle of a residential section of New York City and lasted
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for over half an hour during which the victim screamed for help. According to the New York Times, there were at least 38 witnesses had observed the attack. None of the witnesses bothered to intervene or even call the police. The situation obviously gained a lot of attention and the question was why anyone didn’t help Kitty. The public blamed it on “moral decay”, “dehumanization produced by the urban environment”, “alienation etc. The researchers analyzed at this situation and concluded the lack of intervention was beyond apathy and indifference. Darley and Latane examined different situations in order to research the change in a bystander’s response to a situation, when only the bystander in present and when there are other observers present.
In an emergency situation where the only the bystander is present, the bystander might fear for their safety but all of the pressure to intervene is focused on the bystander increasing the chances of intervention. In a similar situation but there are several observers present, the pressure to intervene is shared among all the observers. None of the witnesses feels solely responsible and this results in no action from the witnesses. In terms of blame, individual behavior is driven on consequences and this influences a bystander to act. In a group, blame cannot be assigned to a single individual resulting in inaction. In a case where observes are known to be present but their behavior cannot be observed, a bystander can assume the observers have intervened so the bystander’s intervention is unnecessary. The researchers began their experiment with the hypothesis that the more bystanders present at an emergency; the less likely any one bystander will …show more content…
intervene. Procedure The experiment created a realistic emergency where bystanders were blocked from communicating with each other to prevent the bystanders from discussing their reactions to the situation. The experiment was also assessed for speed and frequency of the bystander’s reaction to the emergency. In the experiment scenario, a college student was sat into an individual room with an intercom system to communicate with other participants for a discussion. During the discussion, one of the subjects underwent a nervous seizure. The subject experiencing the fit could not talk to the other discussants or know if they were doing anything about the emergency. The independent variable was the number of people thought to be in the discussion group. The dependent variable was the speed at which the subjects reported the emergency to the experimenter. The reported response times were measured from the start of the seizure. The experiment ended when the subject reported the emergency or after six minutes of inaction by the subject. After the experiment ended, subjects were required to fill a questionnaire about their thoughts and feeling during the situation. The subjects also had to complete scales of Machiavellianism, anomie, authoritarianism, social desirability, and social responsibility. Subjects had to report vital statistics and socioeconomic status as well. Results All subjects reported to perceive the fit as real. The number of bystanders greatly affected the percentage of reports. Eight five percent of subjects reported the fit when they thought they were alone in the situation while only thirty one percent of the subjects reported the fit when they thought they were part of a group of three to six individuals. The sex and mental competence of the subjects did not seem to influence the speed or percentage of responses. Personality and background did not provide a significant basis to predict whether a subject is likely to respond. Reasons for intervention included “I didn’t know what to do”, “I thought it must be some sort of fake” and “I didn’t know exactly what was happening”. Researchers concluded that the subjects checked few reasons for intervention because they had few coherent thoughts during the fit. Subjects in groups didn’t not feel as if the presence of others influenced their own behavior. Discussion Even though subjects had different responses to the emergency situation, they all believed to the fit was real. Subjects who reported the emergency were told that the situation was under control and were relieved. Subjects who did not report the emergency held a higher level of concern but simply did not act. The non-responsive subjects were said to be in continuing conflict, which caused them to no act on the situation. The situation created an avoidance – avoidance conflict that some subjects could not overcome. Even with the stress and conflict brought about by the experiment, most subjects reported to be more conscious of psychological research. In conclusion, the results of the experiment suggested that factors such as alienation, Machiavellianism, acceptance of social responsibility, need for approval, and authoritarianism that are used to explain bystander inaction provide no significant information to predict the speed or likelihood of help.
Bystander inaction is more influenced by the bystander’s response to other observers. The experimenters hoped to inform people of the situational forces that affect people’s behaviors in emergency situations in order to help people overcome forces that result in inaction.
I think the study was well designed. One change I would’ve like to see is the group situations. It would have been interesting to see how people in one room together would’ve reacted instead of just knowing that others existed. This might have shown how people observed each other while in continuing conflict. The experiment was testing Kitty’s situation but the study should’ve tested some different situations if the same inaction occurred. This being said, I think the study has merit as it provided a valid explanation for bystander
inaction.
The bystander effect refers to the tendency for an observer of an emergency to withhold aid if the:
Do we ever really know how we will act when put into a hectic situation? Some may be calm and collected in times of need and step up as a leader; others may fall under the pressures put upon them. Though the boys from William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, all react very differently in their particular situation, they all have one thing in common; they all fall victim of becoming a bystander. When looking at John Darley and Bibb Latane experiments on witness behavior, one can easily see that the boys on the island fell into what we know as the bystander effect, while stranded on the island. The work of William Golding shows many occasions where the bystander effect comes into play for the boys and changes their actions.
The bystander effect is a the phenomenon in which the more people are are around the less likely someone will step-in or help in a given situation. THe most prominent example of this is the tragic death of Kitty Genovese. In march of 1964 Kitty genovese was murdered in the alley outside of her apartment. That night numerous people reported hearing the desperate cries for help made by Kitty Genovese who was stabbed to death. Her screams ripped through the night and yet people walked idly by her murder. No one intervened and not even a measly phone call to the police was made.
Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, “The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.” We are All Bystanders by Jason Marsh and Dacher Keltner is an article that reflects on the psychological and social phenomenon that refers to cases in which people do not offer any assistance or help to a victim. Studies say that a person's personality can determine how they react to a bystander situation. In a book called, The Heart of Altruism, author Kristen Monroe writes the altruistic perspective. Altruistic people are strongly connected to other humans and have a concern for the well-being of others. Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief exemplifies the bystander theory through Liesel and
Latane and Darley (1968) investigated the phenomenon known as the bystander effect and staged an emergency situation where smoke was pumped into the room participants was in. Results showed that 75% of participants who were alone reported the smoke, whereas only 38% of participants working in groups of three reported (Latane & Darley, 1968). Their findings provide evidence for the negative consequence of the diffusion of responsibility. In line with the social influence principle, bystanders depend on reactions of others to perceive a situation as an emergency and are subsequently less likely to help. Latane and Darley’s findings were also supported in recent research: Garcia and colleagues (2002) found that even priming a social context by asking participants to imagine themselves in a group could decrease helping behaviour. It can be contended that these findings are examples of social proof where individuals believe actions of the group is correct for the situation, or examples of pluralistic ignorance where individuals outwardly conform because they incorrectly assumed that a group had accepted the norm (Baumeister & Bushman,
On March 13, 1964 a woman by the name of Catherine “Kitty” Genovese was coming back to her apartment in Queens, New York at 3:00 a.m. when she was impaled to death by a serial killer. According to the news, the said attack was about 30 minutes long. During the attack, Kitty Genovese screamed for help numerous times. The killer left the scene when the attention of a neighbor was attracted. Ten minutes later, the killer returned to the scene and murdered Genovese. It came to attention that 38 people witnessed the attack and murder, but all thirty-eight failed to report it until after the murder. This ordeal got the attention of many people including scientists and psychologists who wanted to figure out why this occurred. Later, the events that were published by the news were found to be false. It seemed as if the news was experiencing the bystander effect as well, because their information did not contribute to the actual facts. There were not 38 witnesses to the crime, but several had heard the screams and a few calls were made to the police during the attack. But there was still talk about something that affected the minds of people during emergency situations. This phenomenon has become known as the Bystander Effect. There were several cases that are fairly similar to the Genovese one. As well as the Genovese case, these occurrences attracted the attention of many scientists and even the news had something to say about “apathy.” Is the bystander effect real? My hypothesis is that the bystander effect is in fact, a real everyday occurrence that limits the help offered by people. This is due to the number of bystander present during a given situation. The Bystander Effect is the social psychological idea that refers to cases in whi...
Also, social psychologists have long been concerned in when and why some individuals help others while some decline to help. Although the evidence for the inhibitory effect confounding, there are also counter-examples which exemplifies individuals demonstrating pro-social behavior in the presence of others. Hence, while the bystander effect can have a negative impact on prosocial behavior, altruism and heroism, researchers have identified factors that can help people overcome this predisposition and increase the probability that they will engage in helping act. Lantane and Darley (1968) proposed a five-step psychological process model to account for the bystander effect. These processes include observing that a critical situation is current, interpret the circumstance as a crisis, generate a feeling of individual obligation, believe that we have the adequate skills necessary to succeed, and finally reaching a conscious decision to render help (hellen et al )
Most attackers engaged in some behavior prior to the incident that caused others concern or indicated a need for help.
Video: American Psychological Association. (2012, October 4). "This Is Psychology" Episode 5: Eyewitness testimony. Retrieved December 9, 2013
Fischer, P., Krueger, J., Greitemeyer, T., Kastenmüller, A., Vogrincic, C., Frey, D., Heene, M., Wicher, M., & Kainbacher, M. (2011). The bystander-effect: A meta-analytic review on bystander intervention in dangerous and non-dangerous emergencies. Psychological Bulletin, 137, 517-537.
In his article, “The Perils of Obedience” Stanley Milgram conducted an experiment to discover the causes that lead people to obey whether that were right or wrong against their personal conscience . He concluded that people are likely to obey an authority figure when asked to do something immoral even if it may injured someone badly.
Participants “the teacher” were asked to delivered electric shock to a 50 years old man “the learner” who was tied on the other side of the room. The Idea of the experiment was identifying how people obey to an authority person. However, participants were not aware that the study was about obedience and the other person was not actually being electrocuted.
Darley, J. M. & Latané, B. (1968) Bystander intervention in emergencies: Diffusion of responsibility, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 8, 377–383
I conducted an experiment, which I designed to mimic Solomon Asch’s conformity experiment of 1951. This allowed me to determine how individuals act when placed in unclear situations.
The experimenter lost power when there was an increased amount of distance between the experimenter and the subject. For example, when the experimenter’s orders were given by phone then there was a sharp drop-off in obedience versus when the experimenter had a physical presence near the subject. When two authority figures are in conflict produces a change in people, and they are not able to decide which authority figure orders to follow, so they follow neither. The rebellious acts of others seem to influence a change in people to disobey the experimenter. When a few individuals decided to disobey the experimenter orders, then a few more followed and disobeyed the orders and refused to go beyond a certain shock