Piliavin Experiment

• The Piliavin field experiment's aim was to:

  • Investigate bystander behaviour owing to the murdering of Kitty Genovese.
  • Study which condition would have more people helping someone in distress (with Good Samaritanism)

  
• The Piliavin experiment's procedure used:

  • Opportunity sampling with 4,550 men and women passengers during scenes being staged in 1968.
  • Covert observation between 11am and 3pm in 8th avenue.
  • 4 groups of 4 Columbia Uni students. Each group had 2 male actors (victim, model - pretend participant) and 2 female observers/confederates. The model in the same area as the victim either: sat still, or offered help to victim after a period of time.
  • The experiment was done on a 7.5 minute non-stop journey in a New York underground train.

  
• The Piliavin experiment's procedure:

  • After the first station stop (70 secs), the victim collapsed on the floor of the critical area, and stared at the ceiling until help was offered.
  • The female observers recorded how many people were in both the critical and adjacent areas, their race, sex, who helped and how long it took them to offer assistance.
  • Over 103 trials, the victim was either sober (not drunk) with a cane or drunk with a bottle in brown paper bag. Note: victim is black/white.

  
• The Piliavin experiment's procedure:

  • The time it took for assistance varied; the model didn’t always offer help.
  • Help was offered from the model by escorting the victim out of the train if the victim received no help after the train stopped at the station (as seen in image)
  • Note: the model was either in an adjacent or critical area, and the train journey was 7.5 minutes.
  • 5-8 trials were repeated daily.

  
• Piliavin's help before 70 second results:

  • 62/65 victim cane trials, passengers helped before model planed to intervene. Contrasted to 19/38 drunk trials.
  • In 81/103 trials, victim offered help before scheduled model.
  •  60% of trials had more than 1 passenger helping the victim

  
• From observations, the people found more likely to be the first ones to help the victim were:

  • Men - 90% of first helpers were males
  • People of the same race - 68% of white passengers helped white victim, compared to 50% of white passengers helping black victim 
  • Help received for the 2 races of victims were generally =, just more participants intervening for same race, especially drunk 
  • Contrasting to other studies, Piliavin saw speed of passenger helping increase in larger groups (≤7) than in smaller groups (3-4). No strong correlation between bystanders and helping behaviour.

  
• Piliavian concluded:

  • People are likely to help someone ill than drunk
  • The cost of helping ill person is less - risk + perception that drunk are more responsible for their unfortunate situation
  • Men are more likely to help than women
  • Women feel the cost of helping is higher for them; women don't help in such emergencies
  • Larger groups are more likely to help than smaller groups.
  • Model intervening victim early elicits/evokes further help from bystanders.

  ↳ Conversely, longer emergency = more likely people are to leave area with less impact that model will have on others helping.

  
• People in Piliavin experiment were less likely to see the situation as ambiguous: clearly the victim needed help 

  • Cost of helping in large group is lower - victim perceived as less harmful 
  • Cost of helping high - could be clearly seen by others as not offering assistance: feel guilty with physiological arousal to stimulate motivation for intervention; want to stop distress by helping 
  • The model’s offer of assistance didn’t influence other passengers 

  
• P & C of Piliavin:

  P: Field experiment - high ecological validity; passengers behave naturally and spontaneously in a busy subway from opportunity sampling & field experiment done covertly. Study applies to IRL bystander behaviour.

  No demand characteristics (altering behaviour from disclosed clues & expectations).  

  C: Passengers unaware of being observed/taking part in psychological experiment. Passengers did not give consent; might not takepart. 

  C: Distress to participants. They witnessed an upsetting situation, feeling pressure to help, or guilt for not helping the victim.