So when I got to question 7 one of the TA's near the entrance shouted "can I get some help here!! this girl is seizing!!" One of our classmates who had epilepsy was overcome by the stress of everything and had an episode. Every student looked back at girl.... and then the bell rang and we moved forward to the next station. This was a group of students who are all taking up a career to provide medical aid!!!! Some of us used to be PA's, nurses, chiropractors, or MA's.

So how do I validate my actions? Well I froze, I was caught in the thought of "someone else is more qualified to deal with this then myself" (I had been an MA in an emergency department for 3 years, fully qualified). The next thought was self-preservation. I wasn't sure if I broke ranks I would be given the opportunity to continue the exam. I rationalized that there is really nothing to do acutely for a seizure except stabilize the patient and the TA had that under control.

By the second buzzer various professors were heading to aid our classmate. The girl was fine, as I stated had a history of epilepsy and had been on a horrible diet and sleep pattern heading into our test.

Just a little real world experience to add to the debate as to the validity of this experiment.

I also have a question about the experiment: the blog post says that the people were in separate rooms talking over an intercom. Did the subjects even know where the other participants were? Quite a few posts have mentioned that people will not help if they don't know what to do - indecision can be paralyzing. I wonder if the results of the experiment would be different if the subjects knew exactly which room contained the epileptic participant?

Naturally, as she fell, I reached after her. I regrettably missed, but it is about my thoughts after she had fallen that I want to share because I sadly too took part of this terrible form of apathy.

I withdrew my hands once she had hit the floor as if she had been a hot pan. The man that had been in line behind her rushed in and began helping her up. I felt a strong urge to tell him to stop because I had seen the way her head had hit and I was concerned first about a possible neck injury.. but I couldn't get the words out despite my strong desire too. I deferred to him because in my mind he was an "adult" and my inner self was still fashioned as a child in my minds eye. I felt little, weak and helpless.

My point is that I felt powerless as I did, like a child, and I looked to someone else to take that leadership role subconsciously. It didn't matter that I knew what should be done or what I could do.

After the other customer broke the stillness to help the older woman, I felt released and helped as well by getting her the store wheelchair, a cold drink and calling her family and an ambulance. But it took his move to make the rest of us function. It had been as if I was trapped behind a seal of clear cellophane frozen, locked in place. No matter how I wanted to move I couldn't.

Where I am going with this is to touch on the overwhelming sense I had of reverting to a child in that awful moment. We are raised in a society that develops a hierarchy of established niches demanding each person bow to the needs of another. We are choked with laws, lawsuits, a deeper understanding of how things hurt us, and above all fear. And let's not forget the fascination!

As the human herd we follow and find it difficult to lead.

Speaking of herd, and not to compare Humans to wildlife as I know that may offend some, but in a herd of gazelle when an animal is being attacked by a predator, the others continue to flee and watch on, satisfied that they are safe that day because someone else was sacrificed. Water Buffalo flee as if on fire, but being the fierce and gigantic beasts they are they turn back to attack. But even they will watch a fellow member be savagely mauled before one bull or cow finally tiptoes over the invisible line of fear and takes action against the lions. If you watch the scenario, though, it always takes one to go in first before any of the others join ranks.

How often have you watched one of Spike TV's Most Amazing Video's and said to yourself: "Glad that's not me,"?

To go onto a secondary rant, another angle I see is as self preservation. You see someone else throw up and so will you. It's reflex reaction. If they ate something that makes them sick then so might you be. We develop instinctual aversions to things (argue nature versus nurture here). If we see one person in agonizing pain because they've been hit by a car, then we fear going to their aide for fear of our own lives.

Looking back at the story above, I also would like to point out that though I hesitated helping the old woman as a human I could identify with, I have had many occasions before that I put myself in danger to help animals without a second thought. I have been bitten by everything from snakes to horses in the process of these vet aided rescues. So why didn't I hesitate at those times? I truly believe it was due to being less able to directly identify my self image with theirs.

And the presumption is "anyone is more qualified than me." However, other researchers (I can't remember names) have found two correlaries to this study. If someone makes a direct appeal for help, the bystander is more likely to help. It is best to pull the individual out of the group than to appeal to the whole group. Second, knowing about the bystander effect makes you more likely to help.

A simple experiment to test this would simply be to add a nurse/doctor to the group. Then see if that person reacts (which they probably will immedietely).

In fact, I bet if you have two people in the group and one is a nurse/doctor, the other one will not react at all, or delay longer than average...

Like when i'm in a room with someone who gets a heart attack i will help him even though i'm not a doctor, simply because the little help i can give is better than no help. But when there are other people present, chances are that someone whil have a better clue on how to help, so i would wait for someone with more knowledge fit for the ocassion to take action.

with groups who can see each other you'll find them looking at each other sizing everbody up for fitness, till either someone steps up who has some knowledge or some bright soul will think to himself "heck if no one takes action i will".

for the experiment it's not unthinkable every person thought the experiment staff would come to aid, thinking they'd have a better idea on what to do.

2 scenarios where i have personal experience dealing with situations where a stranger needed helped and there were other bystanders/more than 3 members of the public were present.

situaton 1

A woman was hit by a jeep breaking to a stop 5 metres, without instinctive reaction I found myself stunned but picked up my mobile and called for an ambulance.

My mind was filled with worry and concerned for the injured.

situation 2

A woman was yelling "stop thief" and was chasing a man carrying (quite obviously a ladies handbag), a random man X of good built body slammed the thief. The woman caught up and attempted to wrestle her handbag back however he threw her off on the ground and ran towards my direction.

Strangely the entire time I had felt no urge or gut instinct like the 1st situation, but calculating the possible harm he would have caused her or how i would escalate the situation if i intervened; including legal ramifications in the possible use of "excess force".

As well as expecting the X man to continue to intervene as he seemed better qualified physically.

However I have trained extensively in martial arts and in the situation would have had enough of an opportunity to stop the man if I had the benefit of "preparation for the problem" before it happened.

It just seemed that many theories discussed previously here could worked in unison to explain all these things happening to me in why i was able to act sooner in the first situation.

The lack of personal involvement(association with self preservation) in both cases, didn't seem to be the main factor in preventing initial thought/impulse on acting to help. The second situation did have more calculation and hesitation when I "felt"

1: The woman was no longer in danger while the thief was running away.

2: Repercussions for using excessing force, as well as the need for 2 legal warning before disarming a person without martial arts training.

3. The previous involvement of X man, and relinquishing partial if any responsibility to pursue the thief by expect X to continue to act.

Although we may all "lie to ourselves" due to cognitive dissonance, the gut feeling in the situation was present,
i'll be happy if there are any other theories or discussions that can show cause to the difference in the two difference case of behaviours.

A laboratory experiment is a bit different, however. If I were involved in such an experiment that I knew was being closely monitored by scientific professionals, I would be inclined to assume that the individuals monitoring the experiment would certainly help any participant in need of immediate aid. You can bet my reaction time would be significantly slower in that situation.

I remember one time my freshman year in college, I showed up for a class to find the door to the classroom closed. Several students were standing or even seated in the hall, waiting for the door to be opened. Notice that I did not say 'unlocked'. Each new arrival just assumed that the person before them had already tried the door. As people in the group didn't know each other, no one talked to one another to discuss the situation, just went on quiet assumption. I wish I could say that I was the one who finally tried the door and walked right on in, to everyone else's mild embarrassment. I wonder if the phenomenon is related to the one in the experiment.

It seems to me that humans do follow a sort of 'pecking order' code of behavior when in a group, waiting for more able or qualified individuals to take control of an unexpected situation. In the controlled experiment, I expect that most participants desired to help, but felt that more qualified people (qualified scientists who were more likely to know proper first aid) and more able people (scientists running the experiment who actually had access to all the particpants) were already doing what they could.

And in defense of humanity, I have both witnessed and been involved in a variety of vehicular accidents. In all cases, help was immediately forthcoming from bystanders, usually in the form of multiple calls to 911, or, in a case where I was a passenger in my friend's car with my great dane in back, while waiting for the ambulance to arrive (which had been called immediately by at least three witnesses) a worker from a nearby office brought water for all three of us (it was a hot summer day), including a bowl for the dog.

You can bet that if I'm a person's best chance for help, I'll do what I can.

In my experience, people are quite willing to help if someone has an accident, esp. if they're in a 'vulnerable' demographic (the old, the young & mostly women) as its low-risk to offer assitance i.e. no threat to own life.

People who observe an event that requires the emergency services often don't call because they assume someone else has called already & they're just gonna be a nuisance to the police, the ambulance etc. They just don't want to 'kick up a fuss'.

The thing was, as my father went out to get our dogs away from the blaze, he noticed many of our neighbors were just watching our property burn and none of them were bothering to see if we were awake.

In fact, none of them even bothered to call the fire department even after standing there for 20 minutes. At the time, my father was a well-known paramedic in this town, so maybe they all thought that as he and his family was burning alive when the house caught that he'd be able to magically save us... We had to call ourselves.

I also nearly died from drowning in a public pool where there was no lifeguard. I eventually somehow managed to save myself. It wasn't as though they didn't know I was drowning. People even asked me if I was ok afterwards and I told them to politely f*ck off.

However, instead of complaining and not doing anything about this phenomenon, I decided to become the exception. Of course I would later become a lifeguard myself, I didn't feel that was enough. So, I decided to find out why people do this and, from reading much of the research, I think that the bystander effect- as well as poor survival skills- is largely due to failure to prepare. People don't prepare themselves for problems before they happen.