whodunnit? helping behavior

Question 1

3 steps of Bystander-Calculus-model

Answer 1

that according to Jane Piliavin, when we see someone in distress, we go through 3 stages before we respond.
1. physiological arousal
2. labelling the arousal
3. evaluating the consequences

Question 2

empathy costs of not helping

Answer 2

not helping also has a cost, which is

Question 3

personal costs of not helping

Answer 3

not helping also has a cost, which is

Question 4

according to the bystander calculus model, why do ppl choose to help

Answer 4

because they find the situation unpleasantly arousing and want to seek relief.

Question 5

perspective taking and empathetic concern both involve seeing someone else’s view but what’s their difference?

Answer 5

perspective taking is seeing where the person is coming from and understanding it (imagining how person feels), empathetic concern is taking these emotions in and FEELING them as your own. ultimately, different kinds of empathy lead to different helping behavior (imagining how you would feel)

Question 6

Carolyn Zahn Waxler takes an approach that helping behavior is learned and part of socialization, what are the 3 steps in learning how to help

Answer 6

1. giving instructions: telling kids to be helpful to others actually works
2. using reinforcement
3. exposure to models

Question 7

just-world hypothesis

Answer 7

we live in a world that is fucked up and good things happen to good ppl and bad things happen to bad ppl so we can maybe assume that the victim is bad and that they deserve it and we tend to believe that we are good so nothing will happen to us if we don’t help.

Question 8

3 reasons for bystander apathy (why a crowd would be reluctant to help

Answer 8

diffusion of responsibility

audience inhibition/ fear of social blunders - the dread of acting in a foolish or socially unacceptable way

social influence - if no one is reacting, situation may appear less serious

Question 9

latane and darley’s 5 step model of deciding whether to help in emergency situations

Answer 9

1. noticing
2. interpreting
3. taking responsibility
4. deciding how to help
5. helping

Question 10

latane smoke detector experiment brief explanation + results

Answer 10

Participants either tested alone, with 2 other participants they didn’t know or 2 confederates that ignored the smoke completely
Smoke came out of an air vent for 6 mins and they wantd to see how long the participant would take to react depending on different company

Results: alone were super likely to report smoke (75% took action) but only 38% with 2 other participants reacted, with 2 confederates only 10%

conclusion: presence of others can inhibit ppl from responding to an emergency– more ppl, slower response, + if no one is reacting, it persuades other to do the same

Question 11

what did Latane and Darley’s experiments suggest overall?

Answer 11

presence of others can inhibit ppl from responding to an emergency– more ppl, slower response, + if no one is reacting, it persuades other to do the same

Question 12

Latane and Darley’s ‘a lady in distress’ experiment explanation + results

Answer 12

participants hear crashing sound and screams of a lady in another room.
participants were males alone or in partners.
alone: 70% men helped
partners: 40% helped
with a passive confederate: 7% helped

Question 13

Latane and Darley’s ‘hes having a fit’ experiment

Answer 13

Answers the question: do bystanders need to be physically present to lessen the chance of helping?

students could only communicate to each other through a microphone while they each were in a cubicle. Either subject was told it was just them and another participant, a group of 4 or 6. One participant informed everyone he was epileptic. During experiment he pretended to have a fit.
Results: the more bystanders the subject thought were present, the least likely they were to help.

Question 14

what was the purpose of the 3-in-1 experiment

Answer 14

To detect the 3 processes contributing to bystander effect (diffusion of responsibility, audience inhibition and social influence)

Question 15

Latane and Darley’s 3-in-1 experiment

Answer 15

conditions
measuring willingness to help a victim
1. bystander sees and can be seen by others
2. can see but not be seen by others
3. not see but be seen by others
4. neither see nor be seen
results:

Question 16

reverse bystander effect

Answer 16

presence of others can stimulate helping behavior, maybe due to environmental cues such as being filmed by a camera

Question 17

audience inhibition

Answer 17

the lack of competence to help because we think we might make a bad impression. For example: if someone has fallen, we might not want to run over there because it seems foolish to help in such small thing

Question 18

biologically, why do we help

Answer 18

• Researchers say that helping behaviors are innate like eating and drinking
• Also evolutionary social psychology is an extension of evolutionary psychology that sees social behavior as adaptive, helping the individual and the species as a whole to survive
• We see helping behavior in nature such as with animals (vampire bats regurgitate blood to each other even if they can die if they dont get more blood in the next days) dogs also help

Question 19

empathic concern

Answer 19

• A component of batson’s theory of helping behavior
• This makes us more drawn to help someone when we feel empathy for them. We want to act in a open-hearted way
• How YOU would feel

Question 20

Just-world hypothesis:

Answer 20

we believe that good things happen to good ppl and bad things happen to bad ppl so we can maybe assume that the victim is bad and that they deserve it and we tend to believe that we are good so nothing will happen to us if we dont help.

Question 21

bystander intervention

Answer 21

when person breaks from just observing and steps in

Question 22

Latane and darleys cognitive model (5 steps) of deciding to help or not

Answer 22

• Do we notice an event where help is needed?
• Define event as emergency
• Assume responsibility– sometimes u feel like the other bystanders are more qualified than u. But if ur alone and no one is doing anything you gotta take it
• Decide what can be done
• Give help (or not help)

Question 23

what do Latane and darley propose about cognitive model (5 steps) of deciding to help or not

Answer 23

They state that there’s a huge difference in how others decide to help if there is ppl around or they’re alone since ppl base how they act socially on observing others

Question 24

Latane and darley experiments: smoke detector

Answer 24

Participants either tested alone, with 2 other participants they didn’t know or 2 confederates that ignored the smoke completely
Smoke came out of an air vent for 6 mins and they wantd to see how long the participant would take to react depending on different company

Results: alone were super likely to report smoke (75% took action) but only 38% 3 participants reacted, with 2 confederates only 10%

Question 25

Latane and darley experiments: woman getting hurt in other room

Answer 25

Followup experiment with participants hearing a lady get hurt in other room, 70% ppl alone helped and also if participants were with a friend

Question 26

what are processes that contribute to bystander apathy

Answer 26

-diffusion of responsibility
-audience inhibition
-fear of social blunders
-social influence

Question 27

diffusion of responsibility

Answer 27

similar to social loafing, but specifically in an emergency situation if u see other ppl around u hve the opportunity to take the responsibility off your back and transfer it to them

Question 28

Audience inhibition

Answer 28

– when there is ppl watching you can feel shy about acting

Question 29

whats the definition of social influence in terms of helping behavior

Answer 29

ppl turn to the environment to see how others are reacting and if no one is reacting then they can perceive the situation as less severe.

Question 30

limits to bystander effect

Answer 30

• Bystanders who are strangers can make them even less likely to help since communication would be slower
• If bystanders know they will not see each other again, theyre less likely to help
• More likely to help if bystander is an aquaintabnce, friend, child, being abused in a public place.

Question 31

how does good mood affect helping behavior

Answer 31

it increases chance of helping (sunny day and good smells also)

Question 32

how does bad mood affect helping behavior

Answer 32

u may think that since good behavior increases helping, bad moods would decrease it but not in every case. if helping others makes ppl feel better, then it makes sense to help. but only if you think you are responsible for your own bad mood e.g. you feel guilty about doing something bad so u wanna overcompensate and do good. also a study in china showed that ppl were motivated to help more after watching a positive video and those who watched negative or neutral videos were less likely to help.

Question 33

what’s the difference between pluralistic ignorance and bystander effect

Answer 33

bystander effect is purely the phenomenon that the presence of others can inhibit helping. pluralistic ignorance emphasizes that people are still trying to figure out if the situation is an emergency or not by looking at social cues. person feels like they’re the only one perceiving it as an emergency but in reality everyone is secretly thinking the same but acting like nothing is happening on the outside. therefore no one does anything.

Question 34

if you feel lack of competence, how might that affect your helping behavior

Answer 34

Some people do not want to take the responsibility because they think they lack confidence or competence. If the helping consists of only talking or reassuring, people are more likely to help because the task is easier.

Question 35

gender influence in helping behavior

Answer 35

In many situations, men tend to help a woman more than vice versa. The gender of the helper depends usually on the emergency. Also, more physically attractive women receive more help. This same study showed that women were less likely to form social interactions with others.

Question 36

how leaders affect the group experiment by roy baumeister 1988

Answer 36

This experiment shows that leaders tend to have more of a helping behavior than followers.

Question 37

Attributions of responsibility:

Answer 37

people are less likely to help when they thought the problem was

Question 38

Guilty helper:

Answer 38

if you feel guilty about something in the past, you are more likely to help

Question 39

Experiment by Fitzgerald and Colarelli in 2009:
how does blood relatedness affect helping behavior

Answer 39

The study showed the relevance of kin selection. For small risks they chose to help the friend and half sibling as much as the sibling, but when the risk grew, they chose to help the genetic sibling more.

Question 40

what did benson and his colleagues say was a reason for ppl to help

Answer 40

People may intervene in a situation because they feel disturbed by the situation and they want it to be over

Question 41

Cost-benefit analysis

Answer 41

Most people, when they have time to think about their decision to help, do a cost-benefit analysis to calculate the benefits for the victim and themselves. Time is also an important factor → the more time the bystander has, the more likely they will help

Question 42

examples of why not helping in terms of bystander calculus model

Answer 42

The empathy cost is related to how bad we will feel if we don’t help. (has to do with guilt)
The personal cost is what we might lose if we don’t help (affects maybe our health, experience of blame from others, legal consequences etc.)

Question 43

examples of why help in terms of bystander calculus model

Answer 43

The personal cost for not helping is damage to our public image.
The empathy benefit is relieving the stress of the situation
(In the train situation, the personal cost is the shame and the empathy cost is the bystander’s stress and internal shame.)

Question 44

social impact theory basic claim

Question 45

article 1

Question 46

article 2

Question 47

how do communal vs exchange relationships affect whom we help?

Question 48

why do we help? – empathy altruism hypothesis

Answer 48

empathetic concern for a person in need produces an altruistic motive for helping
when we perceive someone needs help we have 2 choices and react differently to each one:
decide to help = adoption of other person’s perspective->feeling empathic concern-> motive is altruistic->feeling satisfied cuz other person’s distress is over.

decide not to help = no adoption of other person’s perspective -> feels personal distress ->egoistic -> satisfaction of motive is the reduction of one’s own distress

Question 49

why do we help according to kin selection

Question 50

negative state relief model of helping

Answer 50

based on the idea that when we see others suffer, we feel bad. therefore, this model proposes that we help in order to ease our own distress not aid the person in need