Social psychology- Piliavin and Levine Flashcards
What is the bystander effect in Piliavins study
Described as the phenomenon where the presence of other people can reduce the chance that people will help someone in need
What are the 2 explanations of the bystander effect
Pluralistic ignorance
Diffusion of responsibility
What is pluralistic ignorance
Likely to occur in an ambiguous situation. Its when a group collectively are not clear as to whether a situation is an emergency or not so whether the person is actually in need.
What is diffusion of responsibility
The idea that people are less likely to help someone if there are others present because they perceive responsibility as being shared between all present and therefore see themselves as being less personally responsible
What was the inspiring event that inspired Piliavin
Social Psychologists became interested in the behaviour of bystanders following the case of Kitty Genovese. A young woman called Kitty Genovese was brutally murdered in New York in the 60s in front of her apartment block. Many of her neighbours could see and hear her being murdered but did nothing to help her when she was in need
What happened in the Latane and Darley case in 1968
Lab experiment which found that bystanders hearing an epileptic fit over earphones didnt report this as they believed others were present so they would help this individual
How did Latane and Darley lack ecological validity
They did not demonstrate how people would react in realistic situations. The confederates had been told prior to the study to ignore the smoke and carry on with the task. Therefore planned to investigate using a field experiment where they could observe behaviour in real everyday settings
Outline the background of Piliavins study of the bystander effect (4)
Piliavin was inspired by the murder of a young girl, Kitty Genovese in New York in the 60s, 38 of her neighbours could hear her being attacked but no one did anything to help. Social psychologists would argue the neighbours displayed the bystander effect, specifically diffusion of responsibility; there were other neighbours who could help so they didn’t see it as their responsibility. Previous lab experiments such as Latene and Darley also inspired PIliavin. They found that bystanders hearing an epileptic fit over earphones did not report this, as they believed others were present so they would help this individual. However, these experiments lacked ecological validity and did not explore helping behaviour in a realistic setting. Piliavin therefore wanted to investigate this further using a field experiment in a more natural situation, a train
What was the aim of Piliavins study
Piliavin set out to investigate how the nature of a situation would affect the helping behavior of those present
What was the research method used in Piliavins study
It was a field experiment that took place on the New York subway. The journeys lasted approximatly 7.5 minutes
What were the 4 independent variables in Piliavins study
1) The type of victim (whether they were drunk or ill)
2) The race of the victim (black or white)
3) The effect of a model (how others would respond when one person offered assistance either after 70 or 150 seconds
4) The size of the witnessing group (number of people on train)
Naturally occuring IV
What were the dependant variables in Piliavins study
1) Frequency of help (how often people helped)
2) Speed of help (how quickly people responded to the incident)
3) Race of helper
4)Sex of helper
5) Movement of critical area(did they move away from the area
6) Verbal comments by bystanders (Qual data)
What was the sample used in Piliavins study
4500 men and women who used the New York subway on weekdays between 11 am and 3 pm
45% of people were black and 55% of people were white
Who was the team in Piliavins study
4 teams of 4 researchers- 2 female observers and 2 males one acting as a victime and one as a model
Who were the victims in Piliavins study
3 white and 1 black
all of them were male
students aged between 26 and 35
dressed alike
They either smelled like liquor and carried a liqour bottle wrapped tightly in a brown bag or appeared sober and carried a black cane
What are the 4 model conditions used in Piliavins study
1) Critical area-early where the model would stand in the critical area and help quickly into the journey
2) Critical late where the model would stand in the critical area and help later into the journey
3)Adjacent area-early where the model would stand in the adjacent area and help quickly into the journey
4) Adjacent area- late where the model would stand in the adjacent area and help later into the journey `
What is a description of what happened during the procedure in Piliavins study
The victim stood near a pole in the critical area. After about 70 seconds he staggered forward and collapsed. Until receiving help -he remained still on the floor looking at the ceiling. If he received no help by the time the train stopped the role model helped him to his feet
What is a description of what happened during the procedure in Piliavins study (2)
At the stop the team disembarked changed platforms to repeat the process in the opposite directions. Between 6-8 trials were run on a given day all using the same “victim condition”
The female observers recorded the dependant variables. One sat in the critical and one sat in the adjacent area.
What was the apparatus used in Piliavins study
Black cane for the ill victim
Bottle wrapped in brown paper bag for the drunk victim
Stopwatch to measure time taken to respond
Notepad/checklist to record observations
What were the quantitative results for Piliavins study
Spontaneous help without the model- 95% cane victim and 50% drunk victim
Overral help- cane victim 100% and drunk victim 81%
Slight tendency for same race helping especially in the drunk condition
Piliavin found no evidence of diffusion of responsibility was found
What were the qualitative results for Piliavins study
More comments were made by passengers in the drunk than the cane condition and female passengers made comments such as “its a mans job to help” and “I would help but i am not strong enough”
What were the conclusion made about Piliavins study
1) When escape is not possible and bystanders are face to face with a victim help is more likely and diffusion of responsibility is less likely
2)An individual who appears ill is more likely to receive help than one who appears drunk as being drunk is seen as self induced in a social context therefore these people are less worthy of help
3)Bystanders conduct a cost-reward analysis before deciding whether or not to help a victim
Suggest why the study by Piliavin et al. did not provide evidence for diffusion of responsibility (2)
Diffusion of responsibility may not have occurred because people were in a closed situation, a train carriage. Due to this confined space, participants could not leave and therefore had no option but to face the situation and help in order to reduce the stress they felt.
Outline why Piliavin’s study can be considered a field experiment (2)
It is a field experiment as Piliavin manipulated the type of situation passengers encountered (e.g. drunk/ill victim) and conducted the study in a natural setting, a train carriageway.