This 11-minute video introduces students to the theory of the bystander effect, including a discussion of the killing in 1964 of Kitty Genovese that spurred John Darley and Bibb Latane to design research that validated the theory. The video shows students how the bystander effect can be used to explain and possibly prevent situations in which bystanders fail to report violence they have witnessed online. Useful for any lesson that introduces the bystander effect or explores the connections between social psychology and social media, the video also presents recently discovered facts that have called into question the established narrative around Ms. Genovese’s death.
The Modern Bystander Effect
Why don’t people intervene when they encounter violence streaming live online?
Social media promised to connect us with our friends, and the world beyond. We have discovered that that includes the happy, the sad and now, the depraved.
Perhaps it was inevitable that videos of playful cats would give way to the darker side of human nature, as ever-present cameras captured the violence taking place in society. But a new level of shock was reached recently when Facebook Live was used to show a live rape and a live beating.
The crimes were horrific enough, but other questions surfaced: Why would someone film an assault instead of intervening? And why didn’t those watching online call the police?
A phenomenon social scientists call the bystander effect was first identified some 50 years ago, after Kitty Genovese was killed outside her apartment in New York City. That case sheds light on behavior in the digital age.
View full episodes at PBS.org/RetroReport.
Related: What the Kitty Genovese Killing Can Teach Today’s Digital Bystanders by Clyde Haberman
- Lesson plan 1: Psychology: The Bystander Effect
- Read transcript
- Producer: Catherine Olian
- Producer: Karen M. Sughrue
- Editor: Sandrine Isambert
- Editor: David Feinberg
- Associate Producer: Olivia Katrandjian