Piliavin et al. Flashcards
(28 cards)
Define altruism
the disinterested and selfless act of helping someone, which by doing so does not serve ay benefit to oneself
diffusion of responsibility
occurs when a duty or task is shared between a group of people - people are therefore less obligated to complete the task
What is the bystander affect
- when an individual does not help someone in a more dangerous situation when other bystanders are around
- supports the fact that if less people are present, an individual is more likely to help
Psychology investigated
- altruism and the bystander affect
link to the assumptions of the social approach
- behaviour, cognitions and emotions can be influenced by groups or social situations
- Behaviour, cognitons and emotions can be influenced by pther individuals
Aim
- to bring a study on altruistic behaviour and the bystander affect to a natural setting (field experiment), and see the effect of 4 situational variables:
- Type of victim (drunk or cane)
- Race of victim (black; white)
- Behaviour of model (instant or not)
- Size of the group of bystanders
hypothesis (3)
- people will be more likely to help their same race
- the ill victim will recieve help more frequently and quickly
- The larger the group, the more latency there will be in the victim recieving help
Number of Pp
4450
Demographic of sample
45% black; 55% white
- mean number of people in the carraige was 43
- lived in NYC between harlem and Bronx
Details on the train journey in Piliavin
- between Harlem and Bronx NYC
- used old NYC subway cars
- between 11am and 3pm weekdays
- 7.5 minute train ride
Groups and who played what role?
4 teams of 4: 4x in a group - 2M and 2F
- both females were observers
- Males were vicitms and models
Vicitm apparatus
- all wore eisenhowler jacket, old socks, no tie
- drunk trials smelt of alcohol and carried a bottle in a paper bag
- Cane victims were ill and held a black cane
Total number of trials
103
Observer one
seated closer to the critical area:
- noted race, gender, location of everyone in the critical area
- counted total number of people in the car
- total number of people came to victim’s assistance, as well as sex & race of these people
Observer two
seated in the adjacent area
- noted race, sex, location everyone in adjacent area
- recorded time taken for first helper to assist after the fall, and if appropriate, first helper after model helped
- recorded any comments from close by
- Tried to elict comments from person sitting next to them
Type of study
field experiment - naturalistic observation
Experimental design
Independant measures
IVs
- cane or drunk victim
- black or white victim
- number of Pp in car
- early or late model helping
- adjacent or critical area - model
DV
- latency for helping victim
- number of Pp in car
- race/sex/location helpers
- race/sex/location all pp
Conclusions (5)
- Ill appearing people are more likely to recieve help than drunk
- males are more likely to help male victims
- Some tendency towards racial helping, especially when victim is drunk
- Diffusion of responsibility was not seen
- the longer the situation goes without help being offered:
a. The less impact model has on helping behaviour
b. people are more likely to leave critical area
Individual vs situational
individual:
- individual experiences of arousal may be different depending on type and relation to model
Situational:
- drunk/cane victim - whether it seemed safe to help
- if someone else is already helping
Generalisability
positive:
- Large sample
- mostly even split between sex and races
Negative:
- specific types of people who use the train at 11am-3pm
- only done in NYC
reliability
Positive:
- standardised observers, victim procedures, length of train rides
Negative:
- no inter-rater reliability as observers were looking for different things
- field experiment - less variables could be controlled
application
- helps people to be aware that biases do come in when help is being offered - should try to reduce this
- you should make yourself appear less threatning if needing help
