A superquick search of my files didn't turn up any cross-cultural studies on
the bystander effect (although there are some comparing different regions of
the US), but an example from England comes to mind. A few years ago
(1994?) a child, Jamie Bolger (sp?) was taken from a shopping area in
England by two older boys (about age 12) who tortured him and killed him.
People later said they'd seen the older boys dragging the younger one away,
but they didn't do anything at the time, for classic bystander research
reasons. Bibb Latane was in England at the time and was interviewed by the
BBC about the incident.
I suspect that this type of effect occurs world-wide. It's not an issue of the
individualism/immorality of the US as Michael Sylvester suggests. Research
_clearly_ shows that it's not a matter of people being "apathetic". The reasons
people are less likely to intervene in situations when there are more people
around are 1) social influence--others aren't acting, so they assume that
acting is inappropriate; 2) audience inhibition--they don't want to look stupid
by doing the wrong thing; and 3) diffusion of responsibility--they assume that
others are just as responsible or more so for helping. It's a matter of
misinterpreting cues and not being sure what to do, not an issue of not caring.
(By the way, the info on reasons cited above is from Latane and Darley,
1976, and Latane, Harton, Rockloff, & Bourgeois, 1996.)
Helen C. Harton, Ph.D.
Department of Psychology
University of Northern Iowa
Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0505
