Emergency and Cost as Determinants of Helping Behavior and the Slow Accumulation of Social Psychological Knowledge

Two variables that should be of primary importance to a bystander deciding whether or not to help are: (I) the need of the victim and (2) the cost to the, bystander. A review of the literature however, provides inconsistent empirical support especially for the need variable. Two field experiments are reported which test alternative conceptualizations of need. The first study, performed by varying the request for a ride in a parking lot, found that subjects who were in the high cost condition and female subjects helped less. No effect of either of two need manipulations produced significant results. Examining our need manipulations using manipulation checks, and examining the need manipulations of two other published studies which produced similar results, we concluded that the manipulations lacked urgency and hence were not emergencies. The second study, performed by using a wrong telephone number situation, varied the degree of the emergency, cost and some additional variables. Results indicated that there was a main effect for emergency and one for cost. When the emergency and cost variables are taken together they create a change of 52 percentage points, or greater than half of the possible percentage range of helping behavior. The limited altruism model which originally consisted of need and cost was revised and an expanded model was presented. In addition, we concluded that the lack of construct validity of manipulations is one of the major reasons for the failure to replicate results in experimental social psychology. A solution is offered.