Piliavin

• Background

  Piliavin was inspired by the murder of a young girl, Kitty Genovese in New York in the 60s, 38 of her neighbours could hear her being attacked but no one did anything to help.

  
  

  Social psychologists would argue the neighbours displayed the bystander effect, specifically diffusion of responsibility; there were other neighbours who could help so they didn't see it as their responsibility.

  
  

  Previous lab experiments such as the smoke filled room by Latane and Darley found evidence for diffusion of responsibility; the majority of people don't ask for help when a room is filling with smoke because no one else does.

  
  

  However, these experiments lacked ecological validity and did not explore helping behaviour in a realistic setting. Piliavin therefore wanted to investigate this further using a field experiment in a more natural situation, a train.
• Aim

  To investigate how the nature of a situation would affect the helping behaviour of those present
• Sample

  Around 4,500 men and women who used the New York subway on weekdays between 11am and 3pm

  About 55% white, 45% black
• What were the 4 independent variables?

  - Type of victim (appeared drunk or ill with a cane)

  - Race of victim (black or white)

  - Effect of a model (how others responded when someone offered assistance after 70 or 150 seconds)

  - Size of witnessing group (naturally occurring IV)
• What were the dependant variables recorded by the 2 female observers?

  - Frequency of help

  - Speed of help

  - Race of helper

  - Sex of helper

  - Movement out of critical area

  - Verbal comments made by bystanders
• Apparatus/materials

  - Black cane for ill victim

  - Bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag for drunk victim

  - Stopwatch to measure time taken to respond

  - Notepad/checklist to record observations (risk of demand characteristics)
• Research method

  - field experiment

  - took place on the NY subway

  - journey lasted approx 7.5 minutes
• Procedure

  - 4 teams of researchers: 2 female observers, 2 males - one acting a victim, one a model (victims were all male, aged 26-35 years + dressed alike)

  - Either smelled of liquor + carried a bottle wrapped in a brown bag or appeared sober + carried a black cane = acted identically (fewer drunk trials performed as male confederates didnt want to = lack of consistency in standardisation)

  - Victim stood near a pole in critical area. after 70 secs, staggered forward + collapsed, remaining still on the floor

  - at stop, team disembarked, changed platforms to repeat

  
  

  
  

  FEMALE OBSERVERS RECORDED DV - ONE IN CRITICAL AEA + ONE IN ADJACENT = RECORDED VERBAL COMMENTS MADE
• What were the 4 model conditions?

  -critical area early

  -critical area late

  -adjacent area early

  -adjacent area late
• Findings - qualitative data


  - more comments were made by passengers in drunk than cane condition + femal passengers made comments eg. 'its a mans job to help' + 'I'd help but I'm just not strong enough
• Findings - quantitative data

  - spontaneous help without model: cane 95%, drunk 50%

  - overall help: cane 100%, drunk 81%

  - slight tendency for same race helping

  - no evidence of diffusion of responsibility
• Conclusions

  - when escape is not possible, bystanders are face-to-face with victim, help is more likely, diffusion of responsibility is less likely

  - individual who appears ill is more likely to receive help than who appears drunk = drunk is seen as self-induced in a social context

  - bystanders conduct a cost-reward analysis before deciding whether to help a victim
• Link to social approach

  This links to the social approach as the presence of other passengers influenced behaviour, in particular the nature of the victim; passengers were more likely to help an ill victim than a drunk victim.

  The environment of the closed, confined space of the train carriage also influenced behaviour; passengers may have felt inclined to help as they couldn't escape the situation, which explains why Piliavin found no diffusion of responsibility.
• Link to key theme of 'responses to people in need'

  Shows that the nature of the person in need effects peoples response to them; for instance, people help ill victims more than drunk victims.
• Ethical issues broken

  - deception = p's unaware that the victim is a confederate, believe it is a real emergency

  
  

  - protection of participants = some p's may have been distressed by witnessing the fall
• Ethical issues followed

  + privacy and confidentiality = no names/personal details taken of those who helped
• Reliability

  Internal:

  + Procedure used is highly standardised

  -> eg. victim acted identically for each condition

  -> increases the replicability of the study in the future = gain more insight into helping behaviour, improving the scientific nature

  
  

  External:

  + Quant data collected

  -> eg. % of helping behaviour was recorded

  -> allows researcher to check for consistency in the results to establish trends in helping behaviour
• Validity

  + High ecological validity = setting is reflective of real life

  -> eg. Used a field experiment = New York Subway -> reflective of real levels of helping behaviour

  -> able to generalise findings of helping behav to real life

  
  

  - Low internal validity = Lack of control over EVs

  -> eg. demand characteristics if p's see victim more than once

  -> cannot determine cause and effect
• Sample

  + Large sample size = increased population validity

  
  

  + No gender bias = can generalise to TP

  
  

  - Lack of responses from people at other times of day

  
  

  - Cultural norms = Drunkenness may be frowned upon
• Ethnocentrism

  - Only 2 races = Unsure of how other races/cultures would respond in same situation

  
  

  - Cultural norms = Drunkenness may be frowned upon
• Individual v. situational

  Individual:

  -> females felt as though there was more risk involved with them helping the male confederates = showing some individuals do a personal cost/benefit analysis

  -> same race helping =race determined higher levels of helping behav towards male confederate

  
  

  Situational:

  -> enclosed environment of train carriage means passengers couldn't escape situation entirely + could have contributed to why they helped

  -> proximity to victim may have been a contributing factor
• Usefulness

  Usefulness:

  -> enhances knowledge of helping behav + bystander effect in a natural environment

  -> practical applications = generalise findings on helping behav to real life + encourage people not to be a bystander

  
  

  Limited usefulness:

  -> only conducted in one city, New York so cultural bias towards helping

  -> lack of control over EVs as natural setting eg. demand characteristics if people see victim more than once