Men are seen as strong individuals who are more than capable to take care of themselves than women. This can be the reason why women are generally helped more than men and why women and men help different type of victims Women are regarded as the weaker sex.
Does this suggest that women are more likely to be helped than men? Could this be demonstrated in all situations?
Aim
To investigate whether the gender of a victim would affect whether or not they would receive help in a situation where they are in need of it.
Hypothesis
The subjects helping behaviour will be affected by the victim’s gender.
Null Hypothesis
The gender of the victim will not significantly influence the helping behaviour received by the subject.
Method
Independent Variable
Gender of the model victim.
Dependent Variable
Helpfulness of the bystanders/ subjects.
Sample
Opportunistic sample. Selecting those around at the available time in Dunstable town centre during a weekday afternoon in June 2002. (The sample would tend consist of middle aged persons to elderly persons, parents and non employed people since younger persons would either by at school, collage, university or work).
Procedure
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Four areas situated in Dunstable’s town centre were selected as appropriate regions to conduct the following experiment since these areas were largely populated with people including a high street, car park, market and shopping centre.
- The model victims, a 17-year-old female and male, carried a load of folders and books and “accidentally” dropped a book. The distance at which the model victim will drop the load will approximately have to be the same in each experiment otherwise this will affect the outcome of the results. If the load is dropped too far away from other bystanders then they probably will not assist the model victim because they are too far.
- As they bent over to pick it up, one or two books dropped to the ground making it very difficult for the victim to pick them up and still manage to keep the rest of his or her belongings in his/her arms. This gave a motive for the bystanders to help.
- It was measured how many bystanders helped the model victim and how quickly they helped and the number of potential helpers in the area. An
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observer, who was seen as just another member of the public, recorded all the data onto the results table.
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The experiment will be repeated three times in each area after a long period of time, so that members of public who either saw the experiment or was involved in it previously, do not come into contact with the second since they would have knowledge of what is occurring and will not participate in the experiment, thus possibly resulting in corrupt findings.
Materials
- Two model victims both 17 years of age, one female and one male.
- Folders and books
- A results table, identical to the one featured below. The location will be noted down. The total amount of bystanders around the model victim at the time of the “accident” will be recorded and the number of people who helped in the situation as well as how long it took before they offered the help will also be noted on the results table.
Results Table
Results- Raw Data
Female Model Victim
Number of people who helped: 13
Number of people who didn’t help: 39
Number of situations in which people helped the model: 11
Total number of scenarios: 14
Quickest time that help was provided: 2 seconds
Longest time before help was provided: 10 seconds
Average response time: 4.9 seconds
Female confederate is helped 11/14 times
Graphs illustrating the results found using the female model along High Street North, Market Area and a Shopping Centre in Dunstable, Bedfordshire.
Results Table- Raw Data
Male Model Victim
Number of people who helped: 10
Number of people who didn’t help: 32
Number of experiments in which people helped the model victim: 8
Quickest time that help was provided: 5 seconds
Longest time that before help was offered: 12 seconds
Average response time that people reacted: 8.5 seconds
Male model helped 8/15 times
Graphs illustrating the results found using the female model along High Street North, Market Area and a Shopping Centre in Dunstable, Bedfordshire.
High Street North
Market Area
Quadrant Shopping Centre
Generally more people did not intervene and help the model victim.
More women helped than males.
Less males were helped than females.
Results analysis
Statistical test
The investigation is both nominal and unrelated meaning that the statistical test to be used is the Chi-squared test.
Cell one: = 0.0087
Cell two: = 0.0028
Cell three: =0.0071
Cell four: =0.0023
…………
Total: 0.0209
The significance test:
- Two tailed experiment
- The level of significance is to 5%.
- So: X P< 0.05= 3.84
The results are insignificant with a value of 0.0209. The expected value for the results to be considered significant would have to have been over 3.84.
The null hypothesis “ the gender of the confederate will not significantly influence the subjects helping behaviour” stands correct over the initial hypothesis.
Explanation of Results
- From the results that I obtained, and by comparing them to those of well known, established psychological investigations gives arise to the reliability of the experiment that I conducted.
- My results suggested that men and women are not helped differently in any way. Women are not helped significantly more than males nor are males helped more than women. Both are helped just as readily.
- However results from established psychological investigation suggest otherwise.
- Piliavin et al discovered that the appearance and type of victim would significantly affect the help they received.
- Eagley and Crowley suggested that men would be helped less and women more due to traditional beliefs that men are independent and more than capable of looking after themselves whilst women are not.
- Thibaut and Kelley’s study regarding the cost reward theory would imply that men are less likely to be helped because the cost of assisting a man than a woman are relatively high when compared. Men, on impression, are considered to be more aggressive, less sociable, less co-operative etc then women.
- Therefore can I be sure that my results are reliable?
Evaluation
- The model victims used in the experiment were white, students both from Dunstable. The findings from the experiment is not representative of the whole population since… unlike pigaet who used diff coloured persons
- The experiment took place in different areas of Dunstable, a small town, bystanders may have seen the student from beforehand carrying out the same procedure…may not have helped
- The experiment took place during one summer afternoon…is this representative of what occurs at other times? The sample- opportunistic- not representative
- Ethical issues: consent, debriefing, protection of participants
- Picking up dropped items- can’t generalise to other situations where help is required- e.g. asking someone for the time or as in kitty genovese- protection against a murderer.
- Good ecological validity
- In order to check the reliability- would be good to repeat this investigation
Further Investigations of interest
Effect of race on whether not help is received
Other situations where help is needed, e.g., asking for the time, and whether or not bystanders would intervene in a stimulated attack, however the ethical issues involved with this would need to be thoroughly considered.
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