Helping and Harming Others: Prosocial Behavior, Aggression, and Attitudes

Helping and Harming Others

Prosocial Behaviour

Prosocial behaviour refers to actions intended to benefit others, including helping, giving, sharing, and cooperating. These behaviours are fundamental to social cohesion and the functioning of societies.

• Definition: Behaviour that benefits another person.

• Examples: Helping someone in need, sharing resources, cooperating in group tasks.

Situational Influences on Helping

People are more likely to help in certain situations, influenced by both the context and characteristics of those involved.

• Escape Difficulty: People are more likely to help if they cannot easily leave the situation.

• Victim Characteristics: Individuals are more likely to help those perceived as deserving (e.g., someone using a cane vs. someone intoxicated).

• Mood: Good mood increases likelihood of helping.

• Role Models: Observing others help increases prosocial behaviour.

• Conformity: Social influence, such as group efforts (e.g., food drives), can increase helping.

• Time Pressure: People in a hurry are less likely to help (e.g., Samaritan study).

The Bystander Effect

The bystander effect describes the phenomenon where individuals are less likely to help in an emergency when others are present. This is due to diffusion of responsibility and social influence.

• Five Steps to Helping in an Emergency:

  1. Notice the event

  2. Interpret it as an emergency

  3. Assume responsibility

  4. Know how to help

  5. Decide to help

• Diffusion of Responsibility: The presence of others leads individuals to feel less personal responsibility.

• Social Influence: People use others' reactions as a guide for their own behaviour.

Why Do We Help Others?

Helping behaviour is influenced by both genetic and learned factors.

• Kin Selection: Evolutionary theory suggests we are more likely to help close relatives to ensure the survival of shared genes.

• Norms of Reciprocity: Social norms encourage helping those who have helped us.

• Learning: Helping can be reinforced through social rewards and internalized values.

• Altruism: The motive to increase another's welfare without conscious regard for one's own self-interest.

Aggression, Attitudes, and Prejudice

Aggression

Aggression is any physical or verbal behaviour, or deliberate failure to act, intended to harm another person or living thing. It can be classified as hostile (driven by anger) or instrumental (goal-oriented).

• Frustration-Aggression Theory: Frustration from being blocked from a goal increases the likelihood of aggression.

• Evolutionary Theory: Aggression may serve adaptive functions, such as competition for resources.

• Situational Influences: Media, aggressive cues (e.g., weapons), arousal, alcohol, drugs, and temperature can all increase aggression.

Heat and Aggression

Research shows that higher temperatures are associated with increased rates of aggressive behaviour and violent crime.

Culture of Honour

Some cultures encourage individuals to defend their honour, which can increase aggressive responses to perceived insults or threats.

Attitudes and Persuasion

Attitudes are evaluations of people, objects, or ideas, and can be changed through persuasion. The ABC model describes attitudes as having affective, behavioural, and cognitive components.

• Affective: Emotional response to the object.

• Behavioural: Actions or observable behaviour toward the object.

• Cognitive: Beliefs or thoughts about the object.

Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM)

The ELM proposes two routes to persuasion:

• Central Route: Focuses on the content and quality of the message; used when the audience is motivated and able to process information.

• Peripheral Route: Focuses on superficial cues such as attractiveness, credibility, or emotional appeal; used when the audience is unmotivated or unable to process information.

Cognitive Dissonance

Cognitive dissonance is the uncomfortable tension resulting from holding two conflicting thoughts or beliefs. People are motivated to reduce this tension by changing their behaviour, rationalizing, or adding new cognitions.

• Example: A person who values health but eats unhealthy food may justify their behaviour to reduce dissonance.

Prejudice and Discrimination

Definitions and Types

• Prejudice: Negative attitude toward an individual based on group membership.

• Stereotype: Specific belief or assumption about individuals based on group membership.

• Discrimination: Negative action toward an individual based on group membership.

Nature and Roots of Prejudice

• Adaptive Conservatism: Evolutionary tendency to distrust unfamiliar individuals or groups.

• In-group Bias: Favouring one's own group over others.

• Out-group Bias: Viewing all members of other groups as similar.

• Explicit Prejudice: Openly admitted negative feelings.

• Implicit Prejudice: Unconscious biases measured by tools like the Implicit Association Test (IAT).

Implicit Associations and Real-World Impact

Implicit biases can influence real-world outcomes, such as police shootings and media portrayals. Training and exposure to counter-stereotypical imagery can reduce bias, but unconscious biases often persist.

Learning and Socialization

Prejudice is learned through parents, peers, and media. Observational learning shapes attitudes toward various groups from a young age.

Contributing Factors

• Scapegoat Hypothesis: Prejudice arises from the need to blame others for misfortunes.

• Just-world Hypothesis: Belief that the world is fair leads to victim blaming.

• Other Factors: Conformity, scarcity, and types of religiosity.

Reducing Prejudice

• Contact Hypothesis: Increased contact between groups can reduce prejudice under certain conditions.

• Superordinate Goals: Working together toward shared goals promotes cooperation and reduces hostility (e.g., Robber’s Cave study).