According to Darley and Latane's (1968) theory, bystanderism is the phenomena in which people

are less likely to assist a stranger in need when other people are present or are passive onlookers.
After the Kitty Genovese incident in New York City in 1964, the theory of bystanderism was
developed. She was the victim of an unnamed attacker who assaulted, stabbed, and repeatedly
raped her. Numerous witnesses claimed to have seen or heard a man slapping a woman after the
incident. Before it was too late, none of these witnesses intervened or phoned the police. For
their own safety, they decided to keep away from the situation and posited that a bystander might
be able to assist her. Because of this circumstance, psychologists have looked into what
motivates people to assist or not in times of need. The two research Latane and Darley (1968)
and Pillavin et al. (1969) would be discussed to support this learning outcome.

In order to better understand bystander involvement and the distribution of culpability, Latane
and Darley (1968) ran an experiment. Their goal was to find out if the quantity of witnesses in an
emergency affected how many people stepped in to help. 59 female and 13 male psychology
students made up the group of 72 participants. They were questioned about the most common
personal issues that freshmen college students can have in a city. Each participant had a set of
headphones, a microphone, and a booth to themselves. They were informed that in order to
preserve participant privacy, the conversation took place via an intercom. A participant (who was
actually an actress) simulated a seizure at one point in the conversation. The number of observers
the participant believed listened to the same conversation served as the independent variable. The
duration of a participant's reaction from the start of their seizure to the time they called the
experimenter was the dependent variable. The findings demonstrated that the participant's
response was significantly influenced by the presence of bystanders. Only 31% of individuals in
the bystander circumstance reported the emergency, compared to 85% of participants in the alone
scenario who experienced a seizure. In this experiment, a factor called "diffusion of
responsibility which is defined as observers expecting another witness to step in, had an impact
on bystander behavior. 18 out of 65 students chose "I did not know what to do," 26 out of 65
chose "I did not know exactly what was happening," and 20 out of 65 chose "I thought it must be
some sort of fake" when asked about their reactions to the experiment after it was over. Although
this experiment supported the bystanderism theory, it had participant bias because all of the
participants were psychology students who took part for course credit. Additionally, it violated
ethical standards by exposing people to deception and anxiety-inducing situations.

The "Subway Samaritan" study was carried out by Pillavin et al. in 1969. The goal was to look
into how different factors affected people's propensity to help others. Teams of students were
formed, each consisting of a victim, a role-model aid, and observers. Whether the victim was
black or white, holding a cane (indicating illness), or intoxicated was the independent variable.
The group acted out two scenarios, one with a victim who was drunk and the other with a victim
who was ill. The "victims" were subway riders who were watched when they passed out shortly
after the train left. If no one else stepped in after 70 seconds, the model assistant was instructed
to do so. According to the findings, someone who seemed sick or intoxicated was more likely to
receive aid.More than one individual assisted in 60% of the trials. The researchers contend that
the fact that the participant could plainly see the victim and determine whether it was an
emergency or not is the reason why the results did not support the "diffusion of responsibility"
idea. In addition, Pillavin et al. found no connection between the number of bystanders and the
decision to assist, defying the hypothesis of bystanderism. According to this study, the
cost-reward model of assisting entails watching an incident unfold in order to elicit an emotional
reaction, such as empathy or disgust. Based on an assessment of the expense and benefit of
assisting, this provides motivation to help or not.

The notion of diffusion of responsibility, which was investigated by Latane and Darley in 1968,
was shown by Pillavin et al. to be false in some instances of bystanderism. While Pillavin et al.
observed that the aforementioned idea is not always true, Pillavin et al. also discovered a direct
correlation between emotions and the readiness to help, Latane and Darley discovered that there
is a direct correlation between the number of onlookers and decision to help.