Helping Behavior

Prosocial Behavior Prosocial behavior - any behavior that helps another person, whether the underlying motive is self-serving or selfless Altruism - Unselfish regard for the welfare of others Sometimes we help people out of guilt or in order to gain something, such as recognition, rewards, increased self-esteem, or having the favor returned

So, Why Don’t People Always Help Others in Need? Would you have stopped and helped this man? (Watch Video – 2 min.)Watch Video

Bystander Effect The tendency for any given bystander to be less likely to give aid if other bystanders are present Famous case of Kitty Genovese: –38 people heard her cry for help but didn’t help. She was raped and stabbed to death

Why Don’t People Always Help Others in Need? Latane studies: –Several scenarios designed to measure the help response Found that if you think you’re the only one that can hear or help, you are more likely to do so If there are others around, you will diffuse the responsibility to others

Diffusion of Responsibility

Why Don’t People Always Help Others in Need? 1.Diffusion of responsibility –presence of others leads to decreased help response –we all think someone else will help, so we don’t 2. Our desire to behave in a socially acceptable way (normative social influence) and to appear correct (informational social influence) 3. Being in a big city or a very small town 4. Vague or ambiguous situations 5. When the personal costs for helping outweigh the benefits

Helping Behavior ABC Primetime looks into helping behavior Video

By staging emergency events in field studies, researchers have found that an individual is less likely to offer assistance or call for help when other people are present than when he or she is the only witness. This is known as the bystander effect. In this field study, an individual steals bicycles, picks a wallet from a purse, and picks a wallet from a pocket, all in full view of several people. Bystanders intervene in only one event. Watch Examples of this Experiment (1:27) Psychology of Bystanders

We’ll help if… We’ve observed helpfulness We’re not hurried We think the victim needs & deserves help The victim is similar to us We are feeling guilty We’re not preoccupied We are in a good mood We don’t perceive danger We know the victim We know how to help

Group Influence

Individual and Groups Social Loafing—tendency to expend less effort on a task when it is a group effort Reduced when –Group is composed of people we know –We are members of a highly valued group –Task is meaningful Women are generally less likely to engage in social loafing than are men. Opposite occurs in many collectivistic cultures, in a pattern referred to as social striving

Social Loafing The tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling their efforts toward attaining a common goal than when individually accountable The larger the group, the the lower each individual’s output People may be less accountable in a group, or they may think their efforts aren’t needed.

Social Facilitation Improved performance of tasks in the presence of others Occurs with simple or well learned tasks Tasks that are difficult or not yet learned the presence of other people is likely to hinder performance

Deindividuation The loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occurring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity People lose their sense of responsibility when in a group.

Group Interaction Effects

Group Polarization The enhancement of a group’s prevailing attitudes through discussion within the group

Social Pressure in Group Decisions Group polarization –majority position stronger after a group discussion in which a minority is arguing against the majority point of view Why does this occur? –informational and normative influences Against For Group 1Group 2 Before group discussion Strength of opinion (a) Against For Group 1Group 2 After group discussion Strength of opinion (b)

Group Polarization

Groupthink The mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision- making group overrides a realistic appraisal of the alternatives Group members try to maintain harmony and unanimity in group Can lead to some better decisions and some worse decisions than individuals

Our Power as Individuals

Self-fulfilling Prophecies When our beliefs and expectations create reality Beliefs & expectations influence our behavior & others’ Pygmalion effect –person A believes that person B has a particular characteristic –person B may begin to behave in accordance with that characteristic

Studies of the Self-fulfilling Prophecy Rosenthal & Fode –tested whether labeling would affect outcome –divided students into 2 groups and gave them randomly selected rats –1 group was told they had a group of “super genius” rats and the other was told they had a group of “super moron” rats –all students told to train rats to run mazes –“genius” rat group ended up doing better than the “moron” rat group b/c of the expectations of the students

Studies of the Self-fulfilling Prophecy Rosenthal & Jacobson –went to a school and did IQ tests with kids –told teachers that the test was a “spurters” test –randomly selected several kids and told the teacher they were spurters –did another IQ test at end of year –spurters showed significant improvements in their IQ scores b/c of their teacher’s expectations of them

PERSUASION The deliberate attempt to influence the attitudes or behavior of another person in a situation in which that person has some freedom of choice

Influence of Others’ Requests —Compliance Sales techniques and cognitive dissonance –four-walls technique question customer in such a way that gets answers consistent with the idea that they need to own object feeling of cognitive dissonance results if person chooses not to buy this thing that they “need”

Sales Techniques and Cognitive Dissonance Foot-in-the-door technique –ask for something small at first, then hit customer with larger request later –small request has paved the way to compliance with the larger request –cognitive dissonance results if person has already granted a request for one thing, then refuses to give the larger item

The Reciprocity Norm and Compliance We feel obliged to return favors, even those we did not want in the first place –opposite of foot-in-the-door –salesperson gives something to customer with idea that they will feel compelled to give something back (buying the product) –even if person did not wish for favor in the first place

Defense against Persuasion Techniques Sleep on it—don’t act on something right away Play devil’s advocate—think of all the reasons you shouldn’t buy the product or comply with the request Pay attention to your gut feelings—if you feel pressured, you probably are