Ch. 11 Prosocial

Question 1

Define Prosocial behavior

Answer 1

Any act performed with the goal of benefiting another person. There may be a benefit in return.

Question 2

Define Altruism

Answer 2

It is the desire to help another person even if it involves a cost to the helper.

Question 3

The following is an example of what:

• Giving someone a jacket during 40 degree weather is altruistic
• Heroes of 911 gave their lives to help strangers

Answer 3

Altruistic behavior

Question 4

Does altruism go with or against our natural selection?

Answer 4

Altruism goes against our evolutionary natural selection (that we’re not going to survive)

Question 5

According to evolutionary theory, who would be most likely to survive:

Those who were completely competitive
Those who were completely cooperative
Those who understood reciprocity

Answer 5

Those who understood reciprocity - We know that if we help someone out now, they will most likely return the favor when I need it

Question 6

Describe Kin Selection

Answer 6

Kin selection is behaviors that will help a genetic relative; helping kin member might decrease their own survival, but kin has the same genes…

Organisms help more, the closer they are related to them

Question 7

Describe the Social Exchange Theory

Answer 7

Social Exchange Theory is
Maximizing rewards, minimizing costs

Rewards & costs of helping
Costs can be extremely high – if it’s high, we might assume that we’re less likely to help according to Social Exchange Theory

Question 8

Where does the self-interest come in the Social Exchange Theory?

According to the theory, do we have empathy?

Answer 8

There’s no genetic basis, the self-interest is more ECONOMIC;

There’s no empathy involved, So it doesn’t really work for homeless people

Question 9

How would the Social Exchange theory explain why we help people?

Answer 9

People are aroused when seeing others suffer to relieve their stress
Cost is stress and discomfort
Reward is reducing the distress

Helping is rewarding for:
Reciprocity

Gain social approval and self-worth

Question 10

What is the Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis?

Does it have a cost-reward factor?

Answer 10

Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis

• The idea that when we feel empathy for a person, we will attempt to help that person purely for altruistic reasons, regardless of what we have to gain

There’s still a cost and reward factor:

• Empathy is increasing the cost of not helping; it increases our distress and the reward is helping someone to stop that distress

Question 11

What are the gender differences in altruistic behaviors?

Answer 11

Men are more likely to perform chivalrous, heroic acts

Women are more likely to be helpful in long-term relationships that involve greater commitment

Question 12

Are there any cultural differences in altruistic behaviors?

Answer 12

People in all cultures are more likely to help anyone they define as a member of their in-group than those they perceive in out-groups

Question 13

What was the main issue of why people didn’t help Kitty Genovese?

Answer 13

Bystander Effect: Greater amount of people, the less likely to help

Question 14

What are the steps to fighting the Bystander Effect?

Answer 14

1. Noticing an event – they need to know that an emergency is occurring
   Being in a hurry makes people less likely to help an injured person
   Helping isn’t predicted by personality scores or topic of sermon (1/2 was giving a speech on parable of good Samaritan)
2. Interpreting the event as an emergency
   Conformity experiment – when others aren’t paying attention to the fire, it makes people think it’s not emergency

Pluralistic Ignorance – false security and reassurance; people look to other people to see how people are reacting (Informational social influence); people don’t leave the room because others are staying in their seat despite the white smoke that was pouring in

The more people in the room, the time to react
Determine it on my own and not others

3. Assuming responsibility (or Diffusion of Responsibility) – Kitty Genovese
   I’m the one who’s going to take charge
   Many witnesses – diffusion of responsibility
4. Knowing how to help
   Even if we do all of the above 3, we may not know how to help
   If we don’t know how to help, we can’t help
   Call 911
5. Deciding to implement the help
   a. Even if we know what help to give, we have to decide whether or not to intervene
   b. Am I actually going to get actively involved in this?
   c. Reasons to not intervene at this point –> unqualified, or too costly… placing ourselves in danger

Question 15

What is pluralistic ignorance?

Answer 15

Pluralistic Ignorance – false security and reassurance; people look to other people to see how people are reacting (Informational social influence)

Question 16

q

Answer 16

If being helped makes ppl look incompetent, they’d rather suffer in silence

Major indicator in helping
Being aware of the barriers to helping – Just knowing about Kitty Genovese makes us aware that we should call

If you don’t act, perhaps no one will

Volunteer – if there’s too much extrinsic motivation, they will be less likely to believe they aren’t really intrinsically volunteering, thus not as likely to volunteer as much
Over-justification
People should believe that volunteering is their free choice (not for school credit; etc).

Question 17

1. Which of the following is not a way in which evolutionary theory explains prosocial behavior?

a. social exchange
b. kin selection
c. the reciprocity norm
d. group selection

Answer 17

a. social exchange

Question 18

2. Amy is walking across campus and sees someone on her hands and knees looking for a ring that slipped off her finger. Which of the following is false according to the empathy-altruism hypothesis? Amy:
   a. feels empathy toward the person, so she will probably stop and help the stranger look for the ring, regardless of whether it is in her self-interest to do so.
   b. feels empathy toward the person, but she doesn’t think she has much to gain by helping, so she decides not to help the person look for the ring.
   c. doesn’t feel empathy toward the person but recognizes her as a TA in her English class. Amy really wants to get a good grade in that class, so she will probably stop and help her TA look for the ring.
   d. doesn’t feel empathy toward the person and doesn’t think she has much to gain by helping, so she decides not to help the person look for the ring.

Answer 18

b. feels empathy toward the person, but she doesn’t think she has much to gain by helping, so she decides not to help the person look for the ring.

Question 19

3. Which of the following is not a reason why being in a good mood tends to increase prosocial behavior?
   a. Good moods make us frame situations more positively, and thus we are more likely to give people the benefit of the doubt.
   b. Helping prolongs good moods.
   c. Good moods make us pay more attention to social norms, so we will be more aware of the altruism norm.
   d. Good moods increase how much attention we pay to ourselves, which makes us more likely to act according to our values.

Answer 19

c. Good moods make us pay more attention to social norms, so we will be more aware of the altruism norm.

Question 20

4. Frank has recently graduated from college and moved from New York City back to the small town in Ohio where he grew up. He now finds that he is much more inclined to engage in prosocial behavior. What is the most likely reason for this change?
   a. Growing up in a small town caused him to internalize altruistic values.
   b. The change in his immediate surroundings changed his likelihood of helping.
   c. College students are less likely to help because they are more susceptible to the bystander effect.
   d. Frank is more likely to engage in negative-state relief when he is in the small town.

Answer 20

b. The change in his immediate surroundings changed his likelihood of helping.

Question 21

5. Luke listened to a lecture in his history class that he found very confusing, but at the end of the class when the professor asked whether there was anything students didn’t understand, Luke didn’t raise his hand. Because no other hands were raised, Luke assumed that other students had understood the material and that he just didn’t pay enough attention. In fact, many students hadn’t understood the material and were in the same situation as Luke. This is an example of

a. jigsaw classroom.
b. self-fulfilling prophecy.
c. ultimate attribution error.
d. pluralistic ignorance.
e. normative conformity.

Answer 21

d. pluralistic ignorance.

Question 22

6. Research on prosocial behavior finds that religious people
   a. help others more than nonreligious people do in virtually all ways.
   b. report on surveys that they help the same amount as do nonreligious people.

c. actually help more than nonreligious people, but
only if it makes them look good to themselves or to others.

d. actually help others less than do nonreligious people.

Answer 22

c. actually help more than nonreligious people, but

only if it makes them look good to themselves or to others.

Question 23

Meghan lives in a single room in a college dormitory. Late one night, she hears a scream coming from just outside her dorm. She is pretty sure that the person needs help because the person yelled, “Help me! I think I broke my leg!” Meghan goes back to sleep, only to find out the next day that the person was on the ground for 45 minutes before someone helped. Which of the following best explains why Meghan
didn’t help?

a. Informational influence.
b. A diffusion of responsibility.
c. She didn’t interpret it as an emergency.
d. Pluralistic ignorance.

Answer 23

c. She didn’t interpret it as an emergency.

Question 24

7. Which of the following is most true?
   a. Listening to song lyrics with prosocial lyrics makes people more helpful.
   b. If we want someone to say yes when we ask for a date, it doesn’t really work to have him or her listen to a song with romantic lyrics.
   c. Playing prosocial video games has no effect on how helpful people will be.
   d. Playing violent video games makes people more helpful.

Answer 24

a. Listening to song lyrics with prosocial lyrics makes people more helpful.

Question 25

Which of the following is true about prosocial behavior?

a. How often people have moved from one place to another influences how helpful they are.
b. There is no effect of personality on prosocial behavior.
c. Being in a bad mood decreases prosocial behavior.
d. People are much more likely to help members of their in-group than members of an out-group.

Answer 25

a. How often people have moved from one place to another influences how helpful they are.

Question 26

10. Which of the following is not true about prosocial behavior?
    a. When people are put in a good mood, they are more likely to help.
    b. People in stable communities are more likely to help than people in communities with high residential mobility.
    c. When people are put in a bad mood, they are more likely to help.
    d. Having an altruistic personality is a strong predictor of helping behavior.

Answer 26

d. Having an altruistic personality is a strong predictor of helping behavior.

Question 27

Who is most likely to run into a burning building to save lives, men or women?

Answer 27

Men - women are more likely to show altruism through long-term stuff like volunteering

Question 28

Why would being in a good mood affect whether I help someone or not?

Answer 28

Good moods make us look on the bright side of life; we give benefit of the doubt
Helping others helps us prolong out good mood - our reward in the social exchange is the mood.
Good moods increase the amount of attention we pay to ourselves

Question 29

T or F: Since good moods help us increase helping, being sad makes us decrease helping.

Answer 29

False - we will increase helping to make ourselves feel better.

Question 30

T or F: People in urban areas are more likely to help people in need because they’re more educated.

Answer 30

False - smaller towns people are more likely to help. They may have internalized altruistic values. Also because of urban overload hypothesis, where there’s constant stimulation and overwhelmingness, being in a small town helps redirect attention to others.

Question 31

What are the 5 steps to Bystander Intervention Decision?

Answer 31

1. Noticing the event
2. Interpret the event as emergency
3. Assume Responsibility
4. Know appropriate form of assistance
   5 Implement decision

Bystander Intervention = NIAKI!

Question 32

What are the reasons as to why Bystander Effect occurs, and why people fail to intervene?

Hint - Explain using the following:
Noticing the event
Interpret the event as emergency
Assume Responsibility
Know appropriate form of assistance
Implement decision

Answer 32

1. Noticing the event
   - People may be distracted
2. Interpret the event as emergency
   - People assume others have called in the emergency (Pluralistic Ignorance)
3. Assume Responsibility
   - Diffusion of personal Responsibility
4. Know appropriate form of assistance
   - Don’t think they are competent or have knowledge to help
5. Implement decision
   - People might be afraid of being sued; costs of helping is too high

Question 33

What should we do if we need help from someone?

Answer 33

We should tell them this is an emergency; Point one person out of the crowd, make eye contact and tell them to call the police.

Question 34

Who am I most likely to lend my notes to if we’re all competing for the same exam: A friend or a stranger?

Answer 34

A stranger - because it would hurt us if our friend did better than us

Question 35

Why does prosocial video games and music make people more cooperative?

Answer 35

It encourages empathy and increases accessibility

Question 36

What’s the difference between someone who has empathy for someone vs. not having empathy for someone?

Answer 36

People will help at a cost to themselves when they feel empathy toward a person in need. When they do not feel empathy, they will help only when it is in their self-interest.