Bystandards Intervention Flashcards
Context of bystandards intervention
In 1964 A woman called kitty Genovese was stab and murdered during early hours of the morning. Her murder was reported by the New York Times an claimed much attention due to the fact that kitty Genovese was not only murdered and raped but 38 people witnessed this and took no action. This caused for many people to write and share their throughout and opinions on this manner. Psychologist took a big interest and started looking into the reasons why this happen.
John Darley and Bibb latane, ‘bystandards intervention in emergencies:diffusion of responsibility’
John Darley and Bibb latene took big interest in this case. They stated that people when faced with an emergency enter a stage of conflict between wanting to help and the fear of being hurt if they get involved.
There theory was that the more people that witness an emergency the less that get involved for the following reasons:
- they assume someone else has already helped
- diffused blame and responsibility
- stage of conflict
- fear of being hurt or humiliated or affected negatively.
The experiment- Darley and latene conducted an experiment were a crisis would happen to test the subjects response.
Overview: college students arrived in a laboratory and where escorted to individual rooms for the purpose of remaining anonymous. They had headphones that communicated to a communication system and where told they would be discussing the challenges of college life. Amongst the groups they would take turns to talk, each participant had two minutes and during that time everyone else microphone was turned off. During this time one of the participants ( a stooge) suffered from a serious seizure and the other participants could not communicate with this participant.
The purpose of the experiment was to see how long it would take the participants to ask for help. If it went longer than 6 minutes with out anyone asking for help the experiment was terminated.
It seemed that participants in pairs or groups of 3 where quicker to react than participant in a bigger group which seemed to be in stages of conflict.
This confirmed their theory that the more people that witness and emergency the less likely or slower they are to react fur to thinking that some one else must already be asking for help.
It was clear that it didn’t have much to do with personality but instead the number of people witnessing. Darley and Latene believe that anyone in that situation would probably act the same as the witnesses did. Their experiment showed that the participants where clearly distressed during the experiment whether they reacted or not… It seems like they were still in a stage of conflict.
France’s Cherry ‘kitty Genovese and culturally embedded theorising
Cherrys research was from a feminist perspective which focused on the fact that kitty was raped and bystanders in the 60’s were less likely to respond to an emergency where a woman is being abused.
Cherry argues that bystanders intervention stripped kitty Genovese murder of vital aspect of the cultural and social context which can help us understand the crime and why the bystanders didn’t act.
Cherry argues in the 60’s it was a society that would do little to intervene in violence against women. It also didn’t recognise the widespread abuse against women. It’s the fact that she was not only murdered but also raped that brought this tongue attention of cultural context. Individuals wouldn’t get involved as they might perceive it as a lovers quarrel, even the police was unlikely to react to a call that could be perceived as domestic abuse.
Cherry feels that during bystander intervention the actual facts of the case where considered. There was no mention of the rape, the crisis wasn’t related to women nor the subject was a women. The context of the case was seen as an example of a psychological phenomenon of bystanders apathy. One of the most important aspect of the case which was the killing and the rape was replaced by group variable during the experiment .its important to understand the concept to understand the behaviour.
What is by standards intervention?
A theory that looks into why bystandards will not get involved in an emergency situation.
