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See You Around Campus: Why People Help, Why They Don’t and What To Do About It. Prepared for

See You Around Campus: Why People Help, Why They Don’t and What To Do About It. Prepared for Counseling Centers of New York. Caroline F. Keating, Ph.D. Colgate University June 6, 2013. A counselor, a social worker, and a social psychologist walk into a bar. Not really.

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See You Around Campus: Why People Help, Why They Don’t and What To Do About It. Prepared for

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  1. See You Around Campus: Why People Help, Why They Don’t and What To Do About It. Prepared for Counseling Centers of New York Caroline F. Keating, Ph.D. Colgate University June 6, 2013

  2. A counselor, a social worker, and a social psychologist walk into a bar . . . Not really But if we did . . .

  3. Why People Help, Why They Don’t and What To Do About It Research Update I. “bystander-effect” Presence of others inhibits helping • Others don’t have to be ‘present’** • Can be a blessing - as well as a curse II. Identify motivational & situational factors III. Implications for designing programs

  4. Prosocial actions intended to benefit others Intervening in emergency situations Helping; altruism Empathy, sympathy, kindness Support, inclusion Sharing, charity, donating Antisocial actions intended to harm others Stigmatization, exclusion, rejection Maltreatment (inflicting punishment, distress) Aggressive behavior hostile or instrumental overt & relational Harmful Inaction – intended or otherwise

  5. icebreaker

  6. Nonconscious cues Shared and Nonshared Social Goals A 2012 meta-analysis of the social goals & aggression of children (18 & younger) revealed a “fit” The BigWE versus bystander effect

  7. Classic “Helping Behavior” Paradigms: Naïve participants alone OR presence of others - others may be naïve OR confederates (passive) “emergency”

  8. Results for the ‘smoke-filled room’ experiment

  9. Piliavin, Rodin, & Piliavin, (1969) Figure 1: Layout of adjacent and critical areas of subway car

  10. Conclusions from Early Bystander Studies • Bystanders inhibit helping • Diffusion of responsibility • Pluralistic ignorance • Evaluation apprehension • Implication for intervention programs based on increasing bystander responsiveness

  11. Recent re-analysis of the bystander effect -- bystanders may be (some of) your best friends But only in the most dangerous situations – which few researchers have put to the test

  12. Disney ABC News: What Would You Do? Host: John Quinones

  13. WWYD Scenario: Abuse of Homeless People 3 key features related to college life: victim: outcast (stigmatized) “campus” emergency = hostile aggression Prediction (according to the bystander effect):

  14. See ABC’s WWYD on the abuse of homeless peoplehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWNQ5zbKw-Q

  15. elements

  16. Group action/peer support Cost of not helping (guilt, shame) elements Responsibility & duty Empathy/sympathy arousal Helper’s High Ease of escape Perceived threat pride, positive affect community humanization norms Ability, expertise disgust, anger

  17. Collective action more likely when • Bystanders are friends& danger is clearly evident • Psychological mechanisms:

  18. Adult men, alone or in groups, matched the face of a terrorist with a body, estimating muscularity & other traits. Fessler & Holbrook, 2013, Psyc Sci

  19. Sadly, a race bias persists • Individual Whites are quicker to come to the aid of White than Black victims even in high emergency situations Individual Blacks = aid Blacks and Whites

  20. From: Kuntsman & Plant (2008). Racing to help: Racial bias in high emergency situations. JPSP, 95.

  21. Fiske (2011). Envy Up, Scorn Down: How Status Divides Us

  22. Can contact with ‘outgroup’ members prosocial behavior? • Koschate et al., (2012) studied workgroups in organizations • Assessed task and personal contacts • Assessed prosocial behavior & empathydirected toward outgroup generally directed toward individuals from outgroup

  23. Results Personal contact increased empathy & help for outgroup individuals Task contact increased expected rewards (& reduced costs) for helping & more help for the outgroup as a whole Applied to campus . . .

  24. WWYD Hazing Scenario:attitudes toward the victim See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMR7t_A55hk

  25. elements

  26. Moral outrage Sympathy for victim? elements disgust

  27. WWYD version of Jersey Shore . . . WWYD: The Drugged Drink Scenario

  28. Youtube links for WWYD parts I and II of drugged drink scenario http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ue_fGd32Ewo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u716oysCtyI

  29. elements

  30. Established bond with abusive agent Evaluation apprehension Presence of like-minded others Appearance of target Concern Relief elements Anger Attitude toward target “America”

  31. Presence of like-minded others • Empowers • Blinds in 2 waysexample: political attitudes (J. Keating, 2013)

  32. Example: enclaves on campus • Men express less willingness to aid a female sexual assault victim after being embedded in an all male group. • Women express less willingness to aid a female sexual assault victim after being singly embedded in a group of males; they express more willingness after being embedded in a group of females.

  33. The mere knowledge that similar others share your goal intensifies goal pursuit • Two experiments: Results: • UGs played a game independently; instructed to either • Study 1: get points • Study 2: avoid mistakes“Similar” others ‘chose’ the same color avatar (minimal group paradigm) • UGs achieved more points (or avoided more mistakes) IF they knew that similar others shared their goal. • Knowing that others share your goal stimulates pursuit; no collaborative effort necessary!

  34. Putting the elements together

  35. Potential solutions: Easy to identify; challenging to implement • The problem Potential solution • Foster the Big We • Shared social goals*-campus-wide projects • Virginia Tech example • Identity salience/large group- Off-campus opportunities BOB, the bus • Promote liking among dissimilar individuals* • -The Ba

  36. Potential solutions: Easy to identify; challenging to implement • The problem Potential solutions • Foster Self-Awareness • (reinforce The Self) • Exposure to individuating experiences (reduce enclavement) • Prime the right self • Reduce social comparison • Meditation/Mindfulness

  37. Potential solutions: Easy to identify; challenging to implement • The problem Potential solutions • Make it easy to intervene • Create a culture of interveners- moral peers • Model intervention • WWYD (use media power)

  38. Thank you! • Colgate’s counseling center • Tech support Wonderful audience – a hand for the volunteers!

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