Chapter 11: Prosocial Behavior Flashcards
what is prosocial behavior
Acts performed with the goal of benefiting
another person – could be selfish
what is altruism
The desire to help another person even if it involves a cost to the helper – not selfish at all
explain evolutionary psychology and altruism
Darwin’s theory of evolution applied to psychology
-Thoughts and behaviors instead of physical adaptations
-How can evolution explain altruism?
-Genes that promote selfish behavior should be passed on
-But altruism exists
what are the three explanations where helping behavior comes from
kin selection, the reciprocity norm, and social exchange theory
explain kin selection
Behaviors that help genetic relatives are favored by natural selection
-Because you share genes with that relative
Burnstein, Crandall, and Kitayama (1994) study
-People are more likely to help genetic relatives than nonrelatives in life-and-death situations, such as a house fire.
-The more closely related to someone you are the more likely you are to help them, especially in life and death situations
-Anecdotal evidence from real emergencies is consistent with these results (Sime, 1983)
what is the reciprocity norm
-the expectation that helping others will increase the likelihood that they will help us in the future
-It’s adaptive for people to cooperate
what is social exchange theory
-We always try to maximize rewards and minimize costs
-When the benefits outweigh the cost, we do something helpful; when the costs outweigh the benefits, we do not help
-Helping comes from self-interest
how can helping be rewarding (three ways)
1) The norm of reciprocity
2) Relief of bystander distress
-Seeing a traumatic incident can be distressful, helping can relieve that distress
3) Direct rewards
-Social approval
-Increased feelings of self-worth
how can helping be costly
-Physical danger
-Pain
-Embarrassment
-Time
-No such thing as true altruism, according to this theory
-This is not as cynical as it sounds – even if we’re helping for selfish reasons, the important thing is that we’re helping.
what is empathy
Experiencing events and emotions the way that another person experiences them
what is the empathy altruism hypothesis
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
explain the Toni and Batson study about helping a classmate on crutches with empathy
Brought people from a psychology class, had them listen to a tape recorded by a student who broke her legs and was in a wheelchair, she needed help with studying and notes; interested in who would help this person
One condition: imagine how this poor woman must feel (high empathy); when you make this decision remember to be objective (low empathy)
Another IV: manipulating costs; one condition she is returning to class (high cost to participant because if you do not help her you will see her there in the wheelchair and feel bad about it); another condition she will be studying at home (low cost you will not see her and feel bad about not helping her if you say no)
Results, found an interaction
-In the high empathy condition: people were likely to say they would help whether it was costly or not
-In the low empathy condition: people were more likely to help in the high cost condition (seeing Carol in class), people just weighed the pros and cons of helping
When we experience empathy for people we are more likely to help regardless of costs
explain Catherine Kitty Genovese
-In New York on a crowded street, lady was a waitress coming home late at night, on way home she was raped and attacked and she was screaming for help but no one came and helped and no one called the police; laid in the street bleeding screaming and no one called; perpetrator came back and killed her
-Neighbors were interviewed and they said they heard something but did not think much of it; why didn’t someone do something?
what are the five steps to helping
1) Step 1: noticing- you have to notice that there is a problem in the first place, urban overload (the idea that when we are walking through cities we tune everything out because there are tons of stimuli we are being presented with)? Distractions (e.g. people looking at phones or with earbuds in)?
2) Step 2: interpreting- have to interpret something as an emergency situation, pluralistic ignorance (in any given situation, when I do not know what is going on it is likely other people do not know either, but I will base my reaction on your reaction, but everyone is doing the same thing- nothing, so we do nothing too)? Relationships (when people think altercations are between two people that know each other they are less likely to get involved, rather than something between two strangers)? Ambiguity?
3) Step 3: ambiguity- whether or not people believe they are responsible for helping, diffusion of responsibility? Social roles (if you are a police officer etc. you are more likely to help)?
4) Step 4: deciding how- can you help? Are you qualified to help (e.g. seeing someone being mugged on the street vs. helping someone get a cereal box)? Essentially now everyone is qualified to help because we all have our phones and can make the call to 911, but if this were not the case people might not step in and help if they are not qualified
5) Step 5: deciding to help- audience inhibition (people do not want to be watched by others)? Costs and rewards (weighing the risk to yourself)?
explain diffusion of responsibility
-When you are the only person there you feel 100% responsible for helping that person you feel solely responsible because if you do not do it the person will not get help
-When there are more people there, people feel less responsible to help the person because they are not the only person that can help in the situation
