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	Social Psychology II

		HELPING OTHERS Philosophers and psychologists have long puzzled over the question of when people help others. On the one hand, we know that humans are capable of great cruelty and callousness toward other members of our species. Yet we also see striking examples of our willingness to help, sometimes at great personal cost. Indeed, a recent Gallup poll found that 100 million Americans are involved in some kind of helping behavior on a routine basis <REF>. Why do people help in some situations, and why do we fail to help in others? Why Do People Help? Sometimes it appears that individuals extend their help to others with no obvious expectation of reward, or even at great personal risk or cost to themselves. People plunge into icy rivers to aid drowning victims, give large sums of money to charity, intervene in muggings, and give CPR to total strangers. If we can't discern an obviously self-serving motive in the helper, we refer to such unselfish behavior as altruism. Altruistic acts can be planned, such as when we donate blood to the Red Cross or volunteer to help build low-income houses with the Habitat for Humanity organization. We can also act impulsively, as when we stop to help another shopper pick up dropped groceries or give money to a Salvation Army Santa Claus on the street. In the sections that follow, we explore factors that facilitate helping. Social norms All human societies develop expectations for behavior that become part of the shared culture. These implicit social rules or norms are communicated to us at a very early age, and exert a powerful influence on our behavior into adulthood. Most societies have evolved norms that prescribe what is expected of a fair and decent person; many of these have an impact on helping behavior. For example, the norm of reciprocity dictates that we help those who have helped us. Individuals are expected to return favors, and may also expect the people that receive our help to reciprocate in the future. The norm of social responsibility obligates us to protect those whom we believe are genuinely needy or are dependent on us. Adults are supposed to take care of children, teachers are expected to be supportive of students, and the healthy are expected to help the injured or infirm <REF>(Schwartz, 1977).
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	Click an activity to open it: • Conformity • Conformity Factors • Milgram Obedience Experiment • Why Obey • Bay of Pigs • Impression Formation • What's Going On? • In Your Face • Actors and Observers • Birds of a Feather • Ratings Game • Love Scale • Love Triangle • Attachment Style • Ad Categorization Activity • Dissonance Theater • Decision Model of Helping • Self-fulfilling Prophecy Movie • Impressions and Expressions • Reducing Prejudice • Prisoner's Dilemma • Faces of the Enemy