8.1: Human Relations

1. 8.1: Human Relations Social Responsibility: Prosocial and Altruistic Behavior

2. Key Terminology Prosocial Behavior Behavior that benefits another or has positive social consequences Some definitions stop short of including intention Helping Behavior Crane uses this term to include intention in the helping of others Altruism Helping behavior with no intention of self-reward

3. IB Learning Outcomes Evaluate psychological research (through theories and studies) relevant to the study of human relationships Distinguish between altruism and prosocial behavior Evaluate research investigating altruism Using one or more research studies, explain cross-cultural differences in prosocial behavior Using research, examine factors investigating bystanderism

4. Biological Level of Analysis: Evolutionary Theory Explaining Altruism Darwin anticipates this pattern Kin selection theory Predicts the degree of altruism will match the closeness of the kin relationship between the helper and the person helped So parents would help their sons or daughters prior to helping their cousins, etc. Supported by animal research and Dawkins�s (1976) selfish gene theory

5. Selfish Gene Theory There is an innate drive for survival This drive makes an individual strive for the survival of their own genes Their own genes are found in their relatives as well, but decreasingly as the familial generations and distance across a family tree increases He calls the pattern to keep one�s genes going the �maximization of inclusive fitness�, survival of genes on a global rather than only individual level

6. Limitations of Selfish Gene Theory Does not explain why strangers often help It is evolutionary, and therefore hard to test in experimentation Genes for helping have not been identified yet, so the supposition is still destined to be only a theory

7. Reciprocal Altruism Theory Trivers (1971) says that non-relative altruism is based on the expectation that, at some point in the future, I will be the one in need, and the favor will be returned Crane states that animal studies with fish show large fish taking care of small fish who clean their gills for them Even when attacked, the large fish seem to give the small fish notice before fleeing

8. More psychological, cognitive theories Lerner and Lichtman (1968) assigned people to work in pairs. One of each pair was a confederate. In a Milgram set up, confederate was always the learner. Teacher was always sympathetic to the learner, and some took his part WHY?

9. Negative-state relief model Schaller and Cialdini (1988) says that rather than altruistic motives, we have egoistic motives to help others so that we feel less guilty and distressed watching their misery On the other side, they also propose that the model explains why others walk away without helping, as walking away reduces stress as well One weakness is that people with feelings of distress do not always take some sort of action; in fact some may stand and watch bad things happen to others

10. The empathy-altruism model Batson (1981) says we can either feel personal distress leading to egoistic helping or empathetic concern, leading to altruistic behavior In his experiment, Carol, a student, is interviewed after a supposed car accident. She needs notes for her psychology class Students were in either a high empathy group (focus on carol�s feelings) or the low empathy group (don�t worry about her feelings) Students were told that either she would be joining their class or that she would be completing the course at home

11. Batson�s study continued High empathy people were equally likely to help Carol Low empathy people reacted in a self-serving way, helping if Carol was returning but not so helpful if she finished at home

12. Van Baaren et al., 2004 When a person is being imitated, he or she is more likely to help (dropped pens) When a person is imitating, this is also true. Mirror neurons may in fact explain this When those neurons are activated by imitation of the other person, those areas of our brains respond as if we had initiated the behaviors ourselves

13. John Rabe: was he altruistic? Firm member of Nazi party Lived in China working for Siemens When Japanese attacked, asked Hitler to intervene He ended up hiding many of his Chinese workers Said he could not betray their trust in him

14. Prosocial Behavior and the Bystander Effect Critical Question: What explanations can we offer as to why people help, or don�t help, in situations where help may be needed? Disposition? Situation?

15. Kitty Genovese�s Murder Latan� and Darley (or reversed) did lots of studies on the topic of bystander intervention Motivated by Genovese case Believed that the situation explains the pattern Believed that our thinking about the situation is swayed by the actions of others

16. The Bystander Effect People are motivated to not help when other people around a possible emergency are not helping

17. Could apathy explain the Kitty Genovese case? Define apathy not acting not feeling concern or compassion for someone in need What do the interviews tell us about the reactions of the 38 witnesses?

18. Could not acting be evidence of pluralistic ignorance? Define pluralistic ignorance What does the pattern look like? Falling woman study � (Latan� and Rodin, 1969) Smoke-filled room study (Latan� and Darley, 1968)

19. Diffusion of Responsibility If there is an assumed presence of others, as the number of others assumed increases, my helping responsibility decreases It is simply mathematical Intercom study by Darley and Latan� shows group of 2 (85%), group of 3 (65%) and group of 6 (31%) levels

20. So what happened then in the Kitty Genovese case? Apathy? Pluralistic ignorance? Diffusion of responsibility?

21. Social Exchange Theory It is all costs versus benefits Will I help? Well, what am I losing or risking? What positive outcome could come about it I do? Put this into your thinking about the Genovese case.

22. Piliavin, Rodin and Piliavin Add to the social exchange theory the arousal present in a possible emergency, and you get arousal � cost � reward Arousal is unpleasant. Taking an action can relieve the unpleasantness. Ignore and shut the window? Run away? Call the police? Yell out your window? Here, arousal will increase with empathy, proximity, similarity of victim, over time. Arousal will decrease if I help, move away, find another helper, or reinterpret situation as a non-emergency Note that this agrees with the Cialdini negative state-relief model

23. Piliavin, Rodin, Piliavin Subway study Doors open, in walk person with cane (or person reeking of alcohol) and some others, among them an observer Doors close, soon out of station person collapses face up Who helps? If cane, people helped at a very high very fast rate (100% of the time median time 5 seconds) If alcohol, 81% of the time the person was helped with median time 109 seconds Rationale? The drunk deserved it but poor cane person.

24. Piliavin analyzed Good ecological validity Some DV�s were hard to quantify or even measure, such as �moving away� and �moving towards� Lack of control � conformity to help may be triggered by one helper. That many people may not have helped on their own.

25. Piliavin one more time Drunk helped less often because the cost is greater (disgust, embarrassment, harm), and not helping would be understandable to those who saw you because he was partly responsible for his own fall Because cost for helping is low and cost for not helping is high, no diffusion of responsibility; often lots of people came to help

26. Role of Social Norms Do I help or not help? Help? Civil rights, sheltering during Nazi invasions, parents as models, religions as model teachers Trocm� and wife (pastors) and his townsfolk in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon shielded 5000 Jews for years, getting them forged documents, food, passage to Switzerland

27. Social Norms Not help? Under the norm of family privacy, we may not intervene in domestic violence cases Shotland and Straw (1976) had a male experimenter attack a female in front of unsuspecting witnesses, one male one female. The woman either shouted, �I don�t know you�, or �I don�t know why I ever married you� Who helped? 65% versus 19%. You tell me!

28. Can we learn to help? Beaman found that a class on helping may actually be influential in increasing helping. Two weeks after participating in the class a fake �need to help� happened in front of the participants, and they were more likely to help than not help

29. One more helping study Staub had kids do something helpful, like make things for sick kids, tutor, make toys for other kids Then saw if they were more likely to help in situations needing help Kids were more likely to help when given the chance

30. Cross-cultural Research on Helping Whiting (1979) looked at kids 3-11 in six countries Different cultures have different levels of helping Kenya, Mexico, and Filipinos scored high US scored low Having younger siblings encourages helpfulness In group bias present

31. More sociocultural research Katz (1981) found that most of us help those like us and help less those who are not like us. Bond and Leung (1988) Chinese and Japanese less likely to help random others, and more likely to help those who look similarly

32. Levine�s cross-cultural studies Small and medium cities in the southeast were most helpful Some of these cities are very large, and in South America, such as Rio de Janeiro and San Jose, Costa Rica People in these places are most likely to help in those environments, not ours.

33. Limitations of studies on helping How do we measure prosocial behavior? Can we translate behaviors across cultural lines? Can we really generalize about an entire culture? Are there then general trends? Can we attribute meaning to a person�s refusal to help? Ecological validity is high, but cause and effect determination may be low.