Young children show the bystander effect in helping situations
Abstract
Much research in social psychology has shown that otherwise helpful people often fail to help when bystanders are present. Research in developmental psychology has shown that even very young children help, and that others’ presence can actually increase helping in some cases. In the current study, in contrast, 5-year-old children helped an experimenter at very high levels when they were alone, but significantly less in the presence of bystanders who were potentially available to help. In another condition designed to elucidate the mechanism underlying the effect, children’s helping was not reduced when bystanders were present but confined behind a barrier and thus unable to help (a condition that has not been run in previous studies with adults). Young children thus show the bystander effect, and it is not due to social referencing or shyness to act in front of others, but rather to a sense of a diffusion of responsibility.
Citation
Plötner , M , Over , H , Carpenter , M & Tomasello , M 2015 , ' Young children show the bystander effect in helping situations ' , Psychological Science , vol. 26 , no. 4 , pp. 499-506 . https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797615569579
Publication
Psychological Science
Status
Peer reviewed
ISSN
0956-7976Type
Journal article
Rights
© The Author(s) 2015. This work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the author created, accepted version manuscript following peer review and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/publications/journals/psychological_science
Description
The authors thank the ESRC for supporting Harriet Over (grant number ES/K006702/1).Collections
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