#diffusion of responsibility

throw in three of your closest friends and you suddenly get 32% dumber. one person falls and goes and unconscious while trying to do a bit and then another player goes unconscious trying to rescue them. someone runs ahead and uses the statue only to be immediately mauled by the scoutmaster with no way of revival. you shoot blowdarts at your friends while they’re standing on ledges because it’ll be funny.

Diffusion of Responsibility (aka the Bystander Effect) is that the "tendency to act to help" is inversely proportional to the number of people around at the time and the responsibility to act is lessened. It is closely related to the Ringelman Effect (the idea being that individual efforts are not as critical if there are other people around).

Is the Bystander Effect Real?

How much does the presence of other people affect our willingness to step in when someone needs help?

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Key points of this article by Bibb Latane and John M. Darley: 

“Alienation, Machiavellianism, acceptance of social responsibility, need for approval, and authoritarianism are often cited in these explanations.  Yet they did not predict the speed or likelihood of help.  In sharp contrast, the perceived number of bystanders did” (pg. 383).

In reference to the Genovese murder:

“[S]pectators knew others were also watching but were prevented by walls between them from communication that might have counteracted the diffusion of responsibility” (pg. 383).

What can we learn?

In an article by Bibb Latane and Judith Rodin, it was determined that the “presence of an unresponsive bystander strongly inhibited subjects from offering to help the injured woman” (pg. 194).  In their study, individuals who heard what sounded like a woman falling and hurting herself assisted the “victim” 70% of the time, but the presence of one other person in the room who seemed unconcerned changed this number to 7%.  

What does this mean for us?

“Safety in numbers” appears to be an inaccurate concept.  We are heavily influenced socially by those around us.  We rely on others for information about how we should react so we do not stand out too much or embarrass ourselves, and the larger the crowd, the more we are comfortable with the diffusion of responsibility, meaning we feel others should act instead.