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Why Do People Often Fail To Help?
The murder of Kitty Genovese in 1964 has stimulated more inquiry into prosocial behavior than almost any other historical event. The most troubling aspect of the case for the majority of people was the inaction of the (at least) thirty-eight witnesses to the crime, who stood by and did nothing to prevent the murder. Surely, people questioned, with that many bystanders, there would be at least one or two individuals who would have been courageous enough to save her? Two social psychologists who had read newspaper accounts of the killing wanted to try and understand the unresponsiveness of the bystanders from another perspective. Bibb Latané and John Darley speculated that perhaps people are less likely to respond to an emergency when there are many other bystanders present. To study this possibility, Latané and Darley <REF>(1970)
created a series of simulated emergencies in their laboratory.
In one such study, college students were asked to discuss some
of the problems of college life with other students. Each participant
was seated in a room alone, with the discussion supposedly to
take place over an intercom system to ensure confidentiality.
Some of the subjects were told that they were talking to only
one person; others thought that they would be in a discussion
with three or six students taking part. In actuality, the contributions
of the other "discussants" were simulated by tape recordings.
Several minutes into the exchange, the real subject heard the
"student" currently speaking over the intercom begin
to sound strange, with his statements becoming more incoherent.
Latané and Darley were curious about what their subjects would do when faced with this fake medical crisis. Would they leave the room in search of the seizure victim or to get help? How long would it take the student to decide whether to act? Although many of the students did try to help, the number of other bystanders the subjects thought were listening to the emergency was an important factor. When the students thought that they alone were aware of the emergency (i.e., that there were no other bystanders), 85% of them left the room to provide help. However, when the students thought that there were two other listeners besides themselves who were aware of the emergency, only 62% of them left the room to help the supposed seizure victim. Finally, of the participants who thought that there were five other bystanders in the situation, less than a third (31%) of them actually got up to help the victim. Those that did end up trying to help also took longer to decide to act when there were more bystanders present (see graph). What Latané and Darley had documented was the bystander effect. People are less likely to help when there are many other people present than when they are alone. That is, for victims there may not be "safety in numbers." What accounts for this rather surprising finding? The initial studies suggested that one factor might be the diffusion of responsibility among the bystanders. When an individual is the sole witness to an emergency, he may feel more personally obligated to intervene; he may say to himself, "It's up to me to do something." On the other hand, when there are many other persons present who could potentially help, individuals may feel less personally accountable. Ironically, in the case of the Kitty Genovese murder, it may have been the sheer number of onlookers that kept her from getting help. If the witnesses to her killing felt that other people must be calling the police, or that at any minute someone else would surely go down to the street and help, each witness may have felt less pressure to act themselves.
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It quickly became obvious that the (prerecorded) student was experiencing
a seizure of some kind.
