The bystander effect

Today, in English we explored 'the bystander effect'. We wrote a mini text about this effect as practice for our assessment.

Reflection: I am proud that I managed to write this in 20 minutes, but went over the 250 word limit. Woops. This was an interesting subject and have enjoyed looking into it.

How often do you say “I will always help somebody in need”? How often do you do so? Are we horrible people or is it just human nature?

The bystander effect is a paradox regarding human nature and our eagerness to help others. The studies have found that in larger groups, people are either less likely to help somebody struggling or will take longer to do so. In one particular study, a group of ten people were watching a faux product placement, where the ‘marketer’ was struggling to put up a tent. On average, it took over eight minutes for anyone to help him. In a group of five people, it took over seven minutes and one person -on average- took three minutes. These results relate directly to the idea of ‘diffusion of responsibility’.

‘Diffusion of responsibility’ is the idea that the more people are in a group, the less likely anyone is to help somebody or take responsibility. Logically, you would think that the more people there are, the more likely there is somebody that will help...But that doesn’t seem to be the case. We are not entirely sure why this is, but many speculate that the more in a group means less responsibility falls upon each individual.

Of course, there will be outliers. People will be more likely to help based on their personality, how comfortable they feel around others and their ability to do so. These variables will always affect how people act around others and how likely they are to show empathy. The thing is, it is potentially dangerous to deflect responsibility. If somebody collapses, or has a heart attack, the time i takes to help them could be the difference between life and death.