Prosocial priming and bystander effect in an online context

Costanza Scaffidi Abbate; Raffaella Misuraca; Chiara Vaccaro; Michele Roccella; Luigi Vetri; Silvana Miceli

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.945630

Prosocial priming and bystander effect in an online context

Front Psychol. 2022 Aug 12:13:945630. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.945630. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Costanza Scaffidi Abbate¹, Raffaella Misuraca², Chiara Vaccaro¹, Michele Roccella¹, Luigi Vetri³, Silvana Miceli¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychology, Educational Science and Human Movement, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
² Department of Political Science and International Relations, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
³ Oasi, Research Institute-IRCCS, Troina, Italy.

Abstract

The present study tested the effect of priming the concept of prosociality on the bystander effect in an online environment. Participants were sent an e-mail requesting a plea for help and randomly assigned to one of four conditions in a 2 (Bystander: 0 vs. 14) × 2 (Priming: present vs. absent) design. The results demonstrated support for the study hypothesis. As expected, the virtual presence of many others significantly reduced e-mail responsiveness except when the request for help is preceded by prosocial priming. Implications of these findings for the literature on the bystander effect and priming are discussed.

Keywords: bystander effect; help; online; priming; prosocial behavior.