The Bystander Effect Summary and Analysis Assignment
The bystander effect occurs when an individual does not help a victim during an emergency situation, regardless of whether the bystander is alone or with other bystanders during the emergency (Meyers, 2010). There have been many papers written on the bystander effect. Two in particular, will be summarized, analyzed, and compared within this essay. The first was written in 1968an was titled, ‘Bystander Intervention in Emergencies: Diffusion of Responsibility’ by John Darley and Bibb Latane, and is a “classic psychology research paper”. The second paper, ‘The Bystander- Effect: a Meta-Analytic Review on Bystander Intervention in Dangerous and Non- dangerous Emergencies’, was most recently composed in May 2011 by Peter Fisher, Joachim Krueger, Tobias Greitemeyer, Andreas Kastenmuller, Dieter Frey, and Claudia Vogrincic. Both papers highlight the bystander effect. The most recent paper complements the content from the classic research paper, which displays how things may change over time, but very seldom does human behaviour change.
In their 1968 paper, Darley and Latane discussed Kitty Genoese’s murder, the epileptic seizure experiment, and what they observed about the bystanders actions. Kitty Genovese was murdered in an alley in New York while at least 38 witnesses made no attempt to help her (Darley & Lata e,1968). Genovese was stabbed multiple times by the assailant and died 30 minutes later (Levine & Collins, 2007). Her screams were heard by many bystanders but all of them remained idle. The bystanders had reportedly seen lights from other apartments and knew others were watching and listening. Words such as moral decay, dehumanization, alienation, and anomie arouse after this incident to reason the fact no action was taken by these bystanders (Darley & Latane, 1968).
Darley and Latane highlighted that when there was only one bystander, the individual feels compelled to act because they...