Piliavin et al Flashcards
what was the background for the study?
Following the Kitty Genovese case, social psychologists began to investigate why people fail to help someone in need.
What is bystander apathy?
Where people fail to act and help someone in need.
What is the diffusion of responsibility?
The responsibility for helping is shared between the bystanders so each individual doesn’t feel enough responsibility to help.
what were the aims and/or research questions?
1) The type of victim: would it make a difference if he was ill or drunk.
2) Race of the victim: would it make a difference if the victim was black or white.
3) Someone setting an example of behaviour: would it make a difference if someone ‘modelled’ helping behaviour in front of them.
4) The number of witnesses: would there be a relationship between the levels of helping behaviour and the number of people witnessing the emergency?
What were the independent variables?
victim conditions: Drunk or sober model conditions) Critical early or critical late adjacent early or adjacent late.
Where did the study take place?
on the New York 8th Avenue independent subway?
Why was the 8th Avenue subway chosen for the study?
The journey was 7.5 mins long and would be uninterrupted.
When did the study take place?
It took place on weekdays between 11 am - 3 pm from 15th April 1968 to 26th June 1968.
How many teams of researchers were there?
4
each was made up of a victim, model and two observers.
How many times was the emergency staged?
103 times with 6 - 8 trials being run on each given day.
How many people participated in the study in the end?
4,450.
What did each observer write down?
One wrote the race, gender and location of each passenger in the critical area. They also counted the number of people in the carriage and the number of people who came to his aid.
Another observer noted the ‘latency’ how long
