Diffusion of Responsibility and the Bystander Effect

One of the most easily noticeable applications of social psychology theories to the real world is the diffusion of responsibility. Related to the bystander effect, diffusion of responsibility describes what takes place when individuals do not take action to help others when in they are in a group, ostensibly because they believe someone else can or should be responsible. Individuals tend to stand by and watch assuming someone else will help, which is why diffusion of responsibility is known as the bystander effect. As natural as it might seem to diffuse responsibility when one is in a crowd, the consequences of the bystander effect can be devastating including loss of life (Lickerman, 2010). For this reason, organizations have recently incorporated Bystander Effect Training into their employee development programs (“Diffusion of Responsibility,” n.d.). For this exercise, I pretended to be a tourist who did not know how to buy a ticket from the metro machine. As suggested for testing the diffusion of responsibility, I performed the simple experiment twice, once during peak travel times and again late at night when there were only a few people in the station.
Situation 1: Crowd
When it was peak hours, I stood looking deliberately confused for a full five minutes before anyone asked if I needed help.
Situation 2: No Crowd
When I performed the experiment late at night, it took only two minutes before someone asked if I needed help.
Explanation of Differences
Diffusion of responsibility is the most likely explanation that accounts for the differences between the crowded and the not crowded conditions. When there are no people around, each person feels like they have a unique responsibility to help. It is almost as if the person senses they are being watched, or might feel guilty if they did not offer. When there is a crowd, a person can hide more effectively, pretending that they are in a hurry or earnestly believing that someone else can offer better assistance than they can.
However, rush hour is a harried time, when most people are commuting to and from work. With less time to spend on extraneous activities, most commuters will be unwilling to help a person unless the person is in distress. Still, it took more than twice as long for a person to intervene in the crowded condition versus the less crowded condition.
Suggestions for Future Research
First, I hypothesize that gender could be an intervening variable. Controlling for gender might help determine whether the bystander effect works differently for males and females. It would be interesting to see, for example, whether females receive intervention quicker than males based on gender stereotypes. It would also be interesting to note whether diffusion of responsibility is more common among males or females.
Researchers could also control for ethnicity to test for cultural norms related to helping. Some cultures are known for being more openly helpful than others, which is why it would be interesting to note different diffusion of responsibility results in the same setting.
Finally, as I suggested in my observations, commuters during rush hour might diffuse responsibility less because of bystander effect and more because looking confused is not considered a serious enough concern to require any intervention. A better research design would be to act as if I had fallen and was hurt, and then test for diffusion of responsibility. I predict similar results, based on prior research on the bystander effect (Lickerman, 2010).


References

“Diffusion of Responsibility,” (n.d.). UPenn. Retrieved online; http://sites.psu.edu/aspsy/2014/02/18/diffusion-of-responsibility/
Lickerman, A. (2010). The diffusion of responsibility. Psychology Today. Retrieved online: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/happiness-in-world/201006/the-diffusion-responsibility