In the readings and text there is a section on helping behavior and altruism. As noted people are not inclined to help in a lot of situations.

In the readings and text there is a section on helping behavior and altruism. As noted people are not inclined to help in a lot of situations. There is at least a delay as people look to each other to determine if help is needed and then wait to see who will jump in and help. Those aspects of assessing the situation were referred to as pluralistic ignorance and diffusion of responsibility. And even when help is offered there may be something to be gained. Altruism is a selfless act of helping others with nothing to be gained by doing so. If you take a tax deduction for a charitable donation there’s something gained, it’s not true altruism. If you work in a kitchen to help feed the homeless, but then constantly mention to your friends that you do so for social recognition and approval it’s not true altruism. Granted people are getting help. And that’s good. But it’s not really altruistic.

So in this discussion let’s see if we can find some cases of altruistic behavior. Try to think of at least one case were you witnessed, or were a part of, a selfless act that helped someone without any gain to the person helping. Briefly describe the situation, what help was needed, how that help was given and all the principle participants. And analyze the event to try to determine for sure that the person providing the help didn’t seek some sort of gain in some way. Seeking gain is the important aspect. If they ended up on the local TV news for their good deed, but never imagined that would happen then they weren’t seeking that recognition.

Hopefully, we’ll get some good stories that will restore our faith in humanity. Submit an initial post by midweek and then comment on the stories posted by classmates by Sunday evening.

PART 2–

Question 12 pts

Social psychology is concerned with the …

Flag question: Question 2Question 22 pts

In social psychology the Rosenthal Effect exemplifies how social expectations can affect interactions resulting in a self-fulfilling prophecy. Our expectations influence our actions toward others, who often react in ways that reflect those expectations. So based on this, if we assume somebody is going to be hostile in a certain situation it’s likely we will …

Flag question: Question 3Question 32 pts

People like to think they are relatively intelligent and often offer excuses, even illogical explanations, when circumstances indicate they have acted foolishly rather than admit having done so. This is explained by …

Flag question: Question 4Question 42 pts

The extreme devotion of cult members as demonstrated by the Jonestown and Heaven’s Gate suicides have been attributed to …

Flag question: Question 5Question 52 pts

In Stanley Milgram’s obedience to authority experiment the last three levels of shock were labeled as extremely dangerous (XXX). How many of the “teachers” continued to deliver shocks right through to these last levels (even though the “learners” were no longer responding by this point)?

Flag question: Question 6Question 62 pts

Correspondence Bias (the fundamental attribution error) refers to the tendency to assume personality characteristics as the reason for certain behaviors, rather than contextual variables (especially for other people). For example, we perceive people who behave badly as evil. However, in many cases …