The Kitty Genovese Murder

Katie Wallace

Psychology 2301

May 9, 2013

Mrs. Strickland

Silent Witnesses: The Kitty Genovese Murder

1. After the 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese, John Darley and Bibb Latane were in shock as the rest of the city/world that a 28 year old lady could be stabbed in a neighborhood with about 38 by standers or more and say or do nothing. Why didn’t anyone try and help her? How could people stand by and watch this go on? People speculated that the failure of people to get involved might be due more to the influence (socially) that bystanders have on each other. To test this theory, Darley and Latane, two psychologists, decided to conduct a study. “Diffusion of Responsibility” Everyone hopes that someone else will be the first to step up and take action. When no one does act, seeing there are other people around provides an excuse for the individual not taking any type of action. I truly believe that most people, not all, have a fear of getting involved in anything horrific, domestic, or just plain wrong because they don’t know the outcome or consequences that that may bring upon themselves. Then you have the people that simply don’t believe in getting involved in other peoples’ drama or situations, so they do hope that someone else will do something because no matter what, they’re not taking any interest in what’s happening.

2. A lot of the reasons for the neighbors not getting involved were absolutely ridiculous! “I didn’t want to get involved. I thought two lovers were fighting. I was afraid. I couldn’t see all that was happening in the dark. I was tired. I don’t know why I didn’t help.” I mean who says these types of things? I personally don’t understand. Even if someone didn’t exactly see what was going on, when it’s all said and done they still heard her scream so they could have simply made a call to the police! Because I’m from New York I feel a certain type of way about this whole situation. Her being outside in Queens that late at night was the...