long, the bystander effect, discussion of near-accident
You know the "bystander effect"? The idea that in a crisis, when there's multiple people around, nobody will do anything because everybody is expecting someone else to do something - the claim being that "individuals don't have a sense of responsibility anymore".
It's a widely believed concept. It's also based on faulty data, never credibly proven, and increasingly being debunked through research of real-world incidents. By all appearances, the theory is complete nonsense.
(The original incident that sparked this theory ended up being much more about failure of the police to respond to calls for help: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese - but that's a different topic.)
More interesting is the question of why people believe they have experienced the bystander effect themselves, if it doesn't exist. And we're not just talking biased interpretation of events, but actual scenarios where nobody stepped in to help.
And I'd like to propose a more credible explanation: what if people just *don't know what to do*, and need guidance?
Look at this video of an incident, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtqBU5xmv5Y (CW: video of fairground ride almost falling over, no injuries to my knowledge)
You'll notice that initially, nobody is responding, nobody is doing anything. But as soon as one person runs towards the ride to counterbalance it - everybody else joins in!
Does this really look like "nobody has a sense of responsibility"? Because to me, it looks a lot more like "people just didn't know what to do, until someone showed them", and the difference is subtle to an external observer.
I think this is a particularly important thing to consider when people raise the bystander effect as a reason why police needs to exist; it's based on the premise that you cannot trust 'regular people' to take the necessary actions to deal with incidents.
But that doesn't seem to be true - they just need to be prepared to know how! And to top it off, poor handling of an incident by police is how the entire theory came to exist in the first place.
long, the bystander effect, discussion of near-accident
@joepie91 I completely agree with you. I've been trained as a civilian first responder so in case of an accident or a disaster I know what to do to save lives. What people generally call the bystander effect is actually also in part the freeze response. Something traumatic happens, they don't know what to do, so they freeze. To snap people out of it, all that's usually required is somebody to address them and give them a clear task. For example, when you see someone collapsing... "You! Dial 911, tell them there's a resuscitation in progress and stay near me! You, fetch the AED at the front desk on the double! You! Get these other people out of here, we need some room!" It doesn't really matter who you point at - they'll most likely snap into action and do as they're told.