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With just a filthy red chunni to cover her, she easily passed off as a bundle of rags dumped on a busy street. And it was a busy street — in Shankar Market, Connaught Place, at the feet of thousands who walked past going to work
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The phenomenon is known as
Diffusion of Responsibility. The more people the more well... everyone saw her, its just that they thought someone else will help... when they saw that no one was helping then they thought that she didn't need help. Over a certain number of people the responsibility just disappears. You can't really blame the people involved but you can
educate them about it. In a situation recognize the phenomenon, step out of auto-pilot mode, say to yourself "A person is lying over there and it is solely my responsibility to see if they need help" and then go help them. Understand that this is not because people are selfish or uninterested or evil or Satan-incarnate... it happens to anyone who is not familiar with the phenomenon; whoever fails to recognize it! The key to tackling Diffusion of Responsibility is simply to recognize where it is occuring.
For example, next time you are walking on the sidewalk in let's say downtown Toronto, a crowded place, and see that a bike has fell off the road side rack.
Recognize that many people are going to walk by and that diffusion of responsibility is inevitable. No one is going to pick up the bike. Be the hero and pick it up yourself.
Wikipedia entry:
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Diffusion of responsibility is a social phenomenon which tends to occur in groups of people above a certain critical size when responsibility is not explicitly assigned. This phenomenon rarely ever occurs in small groups. In tests, groups of three or fewer, everyone in the group took action as opposed to groups of over ten where in almost every test, no one took action. This mindset can be seen in the phrase "No one raindrop thinks it caused the flood". Knowing this, it is always important to respond to emergencies such as a car accident in the light of the mindset, "Well there's so many people driving past this, surely someone has called 911."
Diffusion of responsibility can manifest itself:
- in a group of people who, through action or inaction, allow events to occur which they would never allow if they were alone. Examples include groupthink and the bystander effect.
- in a group of people working on a task that loses motivation because people feel less responsible and hide their lack of effort in the group (social loafing).
- in hierarchical organizations, such as when underlings claim that they were just following orders and supervisors claim that they were just issuing directives and not doing the deeds.
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