Lecture 11 - Helping & Harming

Question 1

What is prosocial behaviour?

Answer 1

behaviour intended to help someone else

Question 2

Define help

Answer 2

making it easier for someone to do something by offering services or resources

Question 3

Define altruism

Answer 3

prosocial behaviour w/o any prospect of personal rewards for the helper (or w clear costs to the helper)

Question 4

Define egoism

Answer 4

behaviour motivated by the desire to obtain personal rewards (including positive feedings about having helped)

Question 5

Define cooperation

Answer 5

2 or more people working together towards a common goal that will benefit all involved

Question 6

When do people help?

Answer 6

1) need - when the helper perceives that the recipient is in need of help

2) deservingness - whether the helper believes that the recipient deserves help

3) Attributions of recipient responsibility - has the person in need “brought it on themselves”?

Question 7

Knowing whether a person is in need of help is facilitated by _____ and hindered by _____

Answer 7

attention
distraction

We often look to other people’s reactions as a way to reduce ambiguity &
make sense of a situation. For example, Latané & Darley (1968) found that
when alone, 75% of people act, but when with two confederates who don’t
act, only 10% of participants act.

Question 8

What factors influence perceptions of deservingness?

Answer 8

relational models exchange norms: helping should depend on diff things in diff relational contexts (e.g. need prioritized in communal sharing, versus reciprocity being prioritized in equality matching - i.. perceiving that someone only deserves help if they have helped you in the past)

Question 9

What are some additional important considerations (when deciding whether to help)?

Answer 9

1) identity of the victim (ingroup vs outgroup)

2) identifiability of the victim (people tend to offer greater help to specific, identifiable victims than to anonymous, statistical victims) –> IDENTIFIABLE VICTIM EFFECT

3) Helper attributes
- agreeableness
- accessibility of prosocial thoughts (whether helping is on one’s mind)

Question 10

What are some situational and social factors that influence the likelihood of helping?

Answer 10

1) the role of others - there can be social inhibition of helping (BYSTANDER EFFECT + DIFFUSION OF RESPONSIBILITY)

2) whether help is expected (Norms of privacy - there is a norm that you should mind your own business)

3) whether one has the time to help

Question 11

What did Shotland & Straw find out about ‘norms of privacy’?

Answer 11

For example, Shotland & Straw (1976) found that when passers-by believed
there is an interaction between a man and his wife (as opposed to between
two strangers), they are far less likely to intervene to help. This is because
there is an expectation of a norm of privacy between a married couple.

Question 12

Whether one has the time to help influenced the likelihood of helping. What did Darley and Batson find?

Answer 12

Darley & Batson (1973) found that whether participants were giving a talk on
‘jobs’ or ‘being a good Samaritan’ didn’t matter to whether they rendered
assistance to a person clearly in need – what only mattered was how much
time they felt they had (63% of people stopped to help in the control
condition, 45% of people helped in the intermediate time condition, and only
10% of people helped in the hurry condition).

Question 13

Why do we help others?

Answer 13

1) helping others feels good

2) From an egoistic perspective - we help to make ourselves feel better and to relieve negative states (NEGATIVE-STATE RELIEF MODEL)

3) From an altruistic perspective - because we really care about relieving the suffering of others

Question 14

What is the negative-state relief model?

Answer 14

suggests that most people don’t like watching others suffer (as this is an aversive feeling), and therefore helping is aimed at reducing this aversive state

Question 15

When is helping greatest?

Answer 15

in people who experienced a negative state which was not removed prior to helping opportunity

helping is greater when one has a negative state which they want to relieve

Harris et al. (1971) found that people were more likely to give donations pre versus post-confession (as they would have had their negative state relieved
via confessing)

Question 16

What is the empathy-altruism model?

Answer 16

suggests that we can help regardless of whether we have other means of reducing our aversive state (showing empathetic concern - compassion, concern, and warmth)

Batson et al. (1981) found that those who feel empathy help regardless of
whether there is an easy alternative way of reducing aversive states (via
escape)

Question 17

How to increase helping

Answer 17

1) reduce ambiguity (in the situation)

2) teach & activate prosocial norms (teach norms that encourage helping - eg. to intervene even in a private affair)

3) infuse (rather diffuse) responsibility - revering the bystander effect by making it people’s responsibility to help

4) promote identification with those who need help (drawing on the identifiable victim effect)

Question 18

Distinguish between dependency-oriented help and autonomy-oriented help

Answer 18

• dependency-oriented help: provides one with a full solution (but limited knowledge / tools for future problem solving) e.g. catching a fish for someone
• autonomy-related help: enables one to independently solve problems - e.g. teaching one to fish so they can do it on their own

recipients prefer autonomy related help

Question 19

Study about autonomy-oriented vs dependency-oriented help

Answer 19

Alvarez & Van Leeuwen (2011) found that participants preferred to receive
autonomy-oriented help regardless of whether it came from a peer or from an exper (feeling more positive about receiving the help, feeling more empowered, feeling
more respected and more competent). However, participants’ reactions to the
helper (respect for the helper, trust in the helper, anger towards the helper) were less favourable when peers offered autonomy-oriented help (compared to
dependency-oriented help). When experts were helping however, feelings towards
the helper were still more favourable when autonomy-related help was provided.

Question 20

What is aggression?

Answer 20

behaviour intended to harm someone else

Question 21

What are the 2 types of aggression?

Answer 21

1) instrumental aggression: aggression used as a means to an end (e.g. as a means to gain greater resources)

2) Hostile aggression: aggression driven by anger (at insult, disrespect, or threats to identity / esteem)

Question 22

Who aggresses?

Answer 22

on avg, men more than women

• Cultures of honor are MORE aggressive than those not characterized by honour norms

(Nisbett & Cohen, 1996) – in these cultures there are norms
for aggression in certain circumstances. It is expected in these cultures that
men should be tough, loyal and ready to fight, and be ready to respond to
insult and threat of material loss with aggression. In these cultures,
aggression serves to enforce one’s rights and protect their family, home and
possessions. Such reputations serve as deterrents, and aggression especially
likely in places in which institutions (e.g. police, government) don’t enforce
one’s rights very well.

Question 23

Differences in Southern USA vs Northern USA in aggression

Answer 23

Cohen, Nisbett, Bowdle & Schwarz (1996) found that participants were more
likely to respond to an insult (a staged bump) with anger (compared to
amusement) if they were from Southern USA versus Northern USA.
Furthermore, after being insulted Southern participants were far more likely
to display non-verbal aggression (giving way to the confederate from a far
closer distance, encroaching on their personal space, as well as shaking the
confederates hand far more strongly)

Question 24

What is the frustration-aggression hypothesis?

Answer 24

Frustration - follows the blocking of a certain goal

this hypothesis suggests that frustration INEVITABLY triggers aggression

this hypothesis was later refined by Berkowitz, who suggested that it is not the goal blockage per se, but the negative feelings / arousal (e.g. anger, irritation) that arise from this goal blockage that triggers aggression

Question 25

What are some cues to aggression?

Answer 25

• aspects of the environment linked to aggression can activate thoughts of aggression (mere exposure to a word can activate aggressive-like thoughts
• social learning (exposure to violent role models + playing violent video games) - increases accessibility of aggressive thoughts
• superficial and deep processing

Question 26

How does superficial and deep processing increase aggressive?

Answer 26

Initial, automatic aggressive tendencies can be overcome by deeper processing (in contrast to superficial processing).

Things that impair deep processing increase the likelihood of aggressive
impulses being realized in aggressive behaviour – these include high physiological arousal, time pressure and alcohol.

Taylor, Gammon & Capasso (1976) found that when
participants believe they are under threat (in the form of an electric shock),
they are more likely to display aggressive behaviour if they had consumed
alcohol. However, when there is no threat of a shock, aggression levels are
similarly low for both participants who had consumed alcohol and those who had not.

Question 27

What DOESN’T work to decrease aggression?

Answer 27

catharsis/venting

the theory behind this is that anger builds up like steam and needs release/purging/cleansing, and expressing negative affect and aggressive tendencies purges one of their aggressive impulses. HOWEVER, THIS IS NOT TRUE.

o Bushman (2002) found that hitting a punching bag actually increases
aggression compared to a control, and this aggression is especially high if this
is accompanied by rumination (compared to distraction).

Question 28

What works to reduce aggression?

Answer 28

1) promoting norms of non-aggression (changing role models e.g. playing prosocial video games)

2) minimizing environmental cues (undermining environmental cues) that promote aggression

3) cognitive re-appraisal (thinking abt situation in different ways - e.g. self-distancing)

4) increasing empathy - take the other person’s perspective

5) aggression minimization strategies

Question 29

What is self-distancing?

Answer 29

where participants
examine the provocation from a third-person perspective. Mischkowski found that
self-distancing decreases the accessibility of aggressive thoughts (‘implicit aggressive
cognition’) (versus both self-immersion and the control), as well as decreasing
overall anger.

Question 30

What do aggression minimization strategies involve?

Answer 30

involve decreasing the accessibility of aggressive conditions, decreasing arousal, and decreasing negative affect

Bushman suggests that targeting one’s present internal state (via delay, distraction, relaxation
and promotion of incompatible responses (prosocial cognitions) will be most likely to decrease aggression