Prosocial behaviour
Definitions:
• Prosocial behaviour - actions that are generally valued by other people in a particular society
• Helping behaviour - acts where people voluntarily and intentionally behave in a way they
believe will benefit others
• Altruism - an act which benefits others but is not expected to have any personal benefits
Why do we help?
Modelling
→ We have learnt to help others by observing the behaviour of others e.g. blood donation study
(Rushton & Campbell, 1977)
→ Social learning theory (Bandura, 1972) - demonstrates behaviour is appropriate & increases
self-efficacy, but only if observed behaviour had positive outcome e.g. lost wallet experiment
(Hornstein, 1970)
Social norms
→ Reciprocity - replicating positive behaviour to each other
→ Social responsibility - individual responsibility to society
→ Social justice
But…
→ Verbal endorsement ≠ actual helping behaviour
→ External factors play a role e.g. need persistence (Warren & Walker, 1991)
Latané and Darley's Cognitive Model (1968)
○ Attend to the incident
○ Define the incident - evaluating the incident, evaluating the need for help
○ Accept personal responsibility
○ Decide what to do
○ Final decision
Tested their model by investigating when and whether the presence of other bystanders would
influence responses to an emergency.
• 75% of participants who were alone reported the smoke to the experimenter
• Only 38% of those with two other participants took any action
• Only 10% of those with two confederates raised the alarm
→ Bystander apathy effect
In what situations do we help?
Case of Kitty Genovese (1964) lead to research to understand why people help in some situations
and not in others - explanations of bystander intervention
→ But, see Manning et al. (2007) - 'modern parable' of the 38 witnesses - what about power of
groups to promote helping behaviour?
How can we explain the bystander apathy effect?
Diffusion of responsibility
• In some situations there is a clear emergency (not ambiguous and no fear of 'getting it wrong')
• When others are present people believe they are less personally responsible
Audience inhibition
• People are inhibited from helping for fear of negative evaluation by others if they intervene
and the situation is not an emergency
• Can be a product of: Normative Social Influence, Informational Social Influence
Piliavin's Bystander-Calculus Model (1981)
Also takes into account the role of diffusion of responsibility in explaining the bystander apathy
effect.
WEEK 4 Page 1
Definitions:
• Prosocial behaviour - actions that are generally valued by other people in a particular society
• Helping behaviour - acts where people voluntarily and intentionally behave in a way they
believe will benefit others
• Altruism - an act which benefits others but is not expected to have any personal benefits
Why do we help?
Modelling
→ We have learnt to help others by observing the behaviour of others e.g. blood donation study
(Rushton & Campbell, 1977)
→ Social learning theory (Bandura, 1972) - demonstrates behaviour is appropriate & increases
self-efficacy, but only if observed behaviour had positive outcome e.g. lost wallet experiment
(Hornstein, 1970)
Social norms
→ Reciprocity - replicating positive behaviour to each other
→ Social responsibility - individual responsibility to society
→ Social justice
But…
→ Verbal endorsement ≠ actual helping behaviour
→ External factors play a role e.g. need persistence (Warren & Walker, 1991)
Latané and Darley's Cognitive Model (1968)
○ Attend to the incident
○ Define the incident - evaluating the incident, evaluating the need for help
○ Accept personal responsibility
○ Decide what to do
○ Final decision
Tested their model by investigating when and whether the presence of other bystanders would
influence responses to an emergency.
• 75% of participants who were alone reported the smoke to the experimenter
• Only 38% of those with two other participants took any action
• Only 10% of those with two confederates raised the alarm
→ Bystander apathy effect
In what situations do we help?
Case of Kitty Genovese (1964) lead to research to understand why people help in some situations
and not in others - explanations of bystander intervention
→ But, see Manning et al. (2007) - 'modern parable' of the 38 witnesses - what about power of
groups to promote helping behaviour?
How can we explain the bystander apathy effect?
Diffusion of responsibility
• In some situations there is a clear emergency (not ambiguous and no fear of 'getting it wrong')
• When others are present people believe they are less personally responsible
Audience inhibition
• People are inhibited from helping for fear of negative evaluation by others if they intervene
and the situation is not an emergency
• Can be a product of: Normative Social Influence, Informational Social Influence
Piliavin's Bystander-Calculus Model (1981)
Also takes into account the role of diffusion of responsibility in explaining the bystander apathy
effect.
WEEK 4 Page 1
