Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cb9f654ff-rkzlw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-08-07T03:12:05.608Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

22 - The Psychology of Bystanders, Perpetrators, and Heroic Helpers

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 May 2010

Ervin Staub
Ervin Staub
Affiliation:
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Get access

Summary

What leads groups of people or governments to perpetrate genocide or mass killing? What are the characteristics and psychological processes of individuals and societies that contribute to such group violence? What is the nature of the evolution that leads to it: What are the motives, how do they arise and intensify, how do inhibitions decline?

A primary example in this article will be the Holocaust, the killing of between 5 and 6 million European Jews by Nazi Germany during World War II. Other examples will be the genocide of the Armenians in Turkey in 1915–1916, the “autogenocide” in Cambodia between 1975 and 1979, the genocide in Rwanda in 1994, and the disappearances and mass killing in Argentina, mainly between 1976 and 1979. Many of the same influences are also present both in the widespread uses of torture and in terrorist violence.

In the United Nations charter on genocide the term denotes the extermination of a racial, religious, or ethnic group. Although not included in the charter, and although some scholars call it politicide (Harff & Gurr, 1990), the destruction of a whole political group is also widely regarded as genocide (Kuper, 1981). In mass killing, the boundaries of the victim group are less well defined, and the elimination of a whole racial, religious, or ethnic group is not intended. For example, in Argentina the victims included Communists, people seen as left leaning, and liberals who wanted to help the poor or supported social change.

Information

Type
Chapter
Information
The Psychology of Good and Evil
Why Children, Adults, and Groups Help and Harm Others
 , pp. 291 - 324
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2003

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Abraham, D. (1987). The collapse of the Weimar Republic. New York: Holmes and Meier
Ajzen, I. (1988). Attitudes, personality and behavior. Chicago: Dorsey Press
Allport, G. (1954). The nature of prejudice. Reading MA: Addison-Wesley
Bandura, A. (1989). Human agency in social cognitive theory. American Psychologist, 44, 1175–1184CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bandura, A., Underwood, B., & Fromson, M. E. (1975). Disinhibition of aggression through diffusion of responsibility and dehumanization of victims. Journal of Research in Personality, 9, 253–269CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bem, D. L. (1972). Self-perception theory. In L. Berkowitz. (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 6). New York: Academisc PressCrossRef
Berkowitz, L. (1962). Aggression: A social psychological analysis. New York: McGraw-Hill
Bettelheim, B. (1979). Remarks on the psychological appeal of totalitarianism. In Surviving and other essays. New York: Vintage
Bickman, L. (1972). Social influence and diffusion of responsibility in an emergency. Journal of Experimental and Social Psychology, 8, 438–445CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bigelow, K. R. (1993). A campaign to deter genocide: The Baha'i experience. In H. Fein (Ed.), Genocide watch. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press
Bloch, S., & Reddaway, P. (1977). Psychiatric terror: How Soviet psychiatry is used to suppress dissent. New York: Basic Books
Bloch, S., & Reddaway, P. (1984). Soviet psychiatric abuse: The shadow over world psychiatry. London: Victor Gollancz
Brewer, M. B. (1978). In-group bias in the minimal intergroup situation: A cognitive-motivational analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 86, 307–324CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Browning, C. R. (1992). Ordinary men: Reserve Battalion 101 and the final solution in Poland. New York: HarperCollins
Buss, A. H. (1966). The effect of harm on subsequent aggression. Journal of Experimental Research in Personality, 1, 249–255Google Scholar
Card, J. J. (1983). Lives after Vietnam: The personal impact of military service. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books
Chandler, D. P. (1983). A history of Cambodia. Boulder, CO: Westview
Craig, G. A. (1982). The Germans. New York: New American Library
Crawley, E. (1984). A house divided: Argentina, 1880–1980. New York: St. Martin's
Dawidowicz, L. S. (1975). The war against the Jews: 1933–1945. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston
DeJong, A. (1978). The Weimar chronicle: Prelude to Hitler. New York: New American Library
DeJong, W. (1979). An examination of self-perception mediation of the foot-in-the-door effect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 34, 578–582Google Scholar
des Forges, A. (1999). Leave none to tell the story: Genocide in Rwanda. New York: Human Rights Watch
Deutsch, M. (1973). The resolution of conflict: Constructive and destructive processes. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press
Devereux, E. D. (1972). Authority and moral development among German and American children: A cross-national pilot experiment. Journal of Comparative Family Studies, 3, 99–124Google Scholar
Dicks, H. V. (1972). Licensed mass murder: A socio-psychological study of some SS killers. New York: Basic Books
Dimont, M. I. (1962). Jews, God and history. New York: Signet
Duster, T. (1971). Conditions for guilt-free massacre. In N. Sanford & C. Comstock (Eds.), Sanction for evil. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
Egendorf, A., Kadushin, C., Laufer, R. S., Rothbart, G., & Sloan, L. (1981). Summary findings. Legacies of Vietnam: Comparative adjustment of Vietnam veterans and their peers (Vol. 1). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office
Eisenberg, N. (1986). Altruistic emotion, cognition and behavior. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum
Elms, A. C., & Milgram, S. (1966). Personality characteristics associated with obedience and defiance toward authoritative command. Journal of Experimental Research in Personality, 2, 282–289Google Scholar
Epstein, S. (1980). The self-concept: A review and the proposal of an integrated theory of personality. In E. Staub (Ed.), Personality: Basic aspects and current research. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall
Etcheson, C. (1984). The rise and demise of democratic Kampuchea. Boulder, CO: Westview
Fein, H. (1979). Accounting for genocide: Victims and survivors of the Holocaust. New York: Free Press
Fein, H. (1993). Accounting for genocide after 1945: Theories and some findings. International Journal of Group Rights, 1, 79–106CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freedman, J. L., & Fraser, S. C. (1966). Compliance without pressure: The foot-in-the-door technique. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 4, 195–202CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Friedrich, V. (1989). From psychoanalysis to the “Great treatment”: Psychoanalysis under National Socialism. Political Psychology, 10, 3–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fromm, E. (1965). Escape from freedom. New York: Avon
Gibson, J. T., & Haritos-Fatouros, M. (1986). The education of a torturer. Psychology Today, 20, 50–58Google Scholar
Girard, P. (1980). Historical foundations of anti-Semitism. In J. Dimsdale (Ed.), Survivors, victims and perpetrators: Essays on the Nazi Holocaust. New York: Hemisphere
Goldhagen, D. J. (1996). Hitler's willing executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust. New York: Knopf
Goldstein, J. H., Davis, R. W., & Herman, D. (1975). Escalation of aggression: Experimental studies. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 31, 162–170CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gourevitch, P. (1998). We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Greene, F. D. (1895). The Armenian crisis in Turkey: The massacre of 1894, its antecedents and significance. New York: Putnam's
Grusec, J. E., Kuczynski, L., Rushton, J. P., & Simutis, Z. M. (1978). Modeling, direct instruction, and attributions: Effects on altruism. Developmental Psychology, 14, 51–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hallie, P. P. (1979). Lest innocent blood be shed: The story of the village of Le Chambon and how goodness happened there. New York: Harper and Row
Harff, B., & Gurr, T. R. (1990). Victims of the state genocides, politicides and group repression since 1945. International Review of Victimology, 1, 1–19Google Scholar
Harff, B., Gurr, T. R., & Unger, A. (1999, November). Preconditions of genocide and politicide: 1955–1998. Paper presented at the Conference on Differing Approaches to Assessing Potential Genocide, Politicides and Mass Killings, Vienna, Virginia
Haritos-Fatouros, M. (1988). The official torturer: A learning model for obedience to the authority of violence. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 18, 1107–1120CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harris, M. B. (1972). The effects of performing one altruistic act on the likelihood of performing another. Journal of Social Psychology, 88, 65–73CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heider, F. (1958). The psychology of interpersonal relations. New York: Wiley
Herman, J. (1992). Trauma and recovery. New York: Basic Books
Hilberg, R. (1961). The destruction of the European Jews. New York: Harper and Row
Hitchcock, R. K., & Twedt, T. M. (1997). Physical and cultural genocide of various indigenous peoples. In S. Totten, W. S. Parsons, & I. W. Charny (Eds.), Century of genocide: Eyewitness accounts and critical views. New York: Garland
Janoff-Bulman, R. (1985). The aftermath of victimization: Rebuilding shattered assumptions. In C. R. Figley (Ed.), Trauma and its wake. New York: Bruner/ Mazel
Janoff-Bulman, R. (1992). Shattered assumptions. New York: Free Press
Keneally, T. (1982). Schindler's list. New York: Penguin
Kren, G. M., & Rappoport, L. (1980). The Holocaust and the crisis of human behavior. New York: Holmes and Meier
Kuper, L. (1981). Genocide: Its political use in the twentieth century. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press
Latané, B., & Darley, J. (1970). The unresponsive bystander: Why doesn't he help? New York: Appleton-Crofts
Lerner, M. (1980). The belief in a just world: A fundamental delusion. New York: Plenum
Lerner, M. J., & Simmons, C. H. (1966). Observer's reaction to the “innocent victim”: Compassion or rejection?Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 4, 203–210CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
LeVine, R. A., & Campbell, D. (1972). Ethnocentrism: Theories of conflict, ethnic attitudes and group behavior. New York: Wiley
Lewin, K. (1938). The conceptual representation and measurement of psychological forces. Durham, NC: Duke University Press
Lifton, R. J. (1986). The Nazi doctors: Medical killing and the psychology of genocide. New York: Basic Books
London, P. (1970). The rescuers: Motivational hypotheses about Christians who saved Jews from the Nazis. In J. Macaulay & L. Berkowitz (Eds.), Altruism and helping behavior. New York: Academic Press
Luther, M. (1955–1975). Works: On the Jews and their lies (Vol. 47). St. Louis, MO: Muhlenberg Press
Mack, J. (1983). Nationalism and the self. Psychoanalytic Review, 2, 47–69Google Scholar
Marton, K. (1982). Wallenberg. New York: Ballantine
Mayer, M. (1955). They thought they were free: The Germans, 1933–45. Chicago: University of Chicago Press
McCann, L. I., & Pearlman, L. A. (1990). Psychological trauma and the adult survivor: Theory, therapy, and transformation. New York: Bruner/Mazel
McCauley, C. R., & Segal, M. D. (1989). Terrorist individuals and terrorist groups: The normal psychology of extreme behavior. In J. Groebel & J. F. Goldstein, Terrorism. Sevilla: Publicaciones de la Universidad de Sevilla
Merkl, P. H. (1980). The making of a stormtrooper. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
Milgram, S. (1965). Some conditions of obedience and disobedience to authority. Human Relations, 18, 57–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Milgram, S. (1974). Obedience to authority: An experimental view. New York: Harper and Row
Milgram, S., & Toch, H. (1969). Collective behavior: Crowds and social movements. In G. Lindzey & E. Aronson (Eds.), The handbook of social psychology (2nd ed.). Reading, PA: Addison-Wesley
Miller, A. (1983). For your own good: Hidden cruelty in child-rearing and the roots of violence. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Moscovici, S. (1973). Social influence and social change. London: Academic Press
Moscovici, S. (1980). Toward a theory of conversion behavior. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Current issues in social psychology. New York: Academic PressCrossRef
Nairn & Simon. (1986, June). Bureaucracy of death. New Republic, pp. 13–18
Nathan, O., & Norden, H. (Eds.). (1960). Einstein on peace. New York: Avenel Books
Nunca Mas. (1986). The report of the Argentine National Commission on the Disappeared. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Oliner, S. B., & Oliner, P. (1988). The altruistic personality: Rescuers of Jews in Nazi Europe. New York: Free Press
Peters, E. (1985). Torture. New York: Basil Blackwell
Pettigrew, T. F. (1997). Generalized intergroup contact effects on prejudice. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 23, 173–185CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Platt, G. M. (1980). Thoughts on a theory of collective action: Language, affect and ideology in revolution. In M. Albin, R. J. Devlin, & G. Heeger (Eds.), New directions in psychohistory: The Adelphi papers in honor of Erik H. Erikson. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books
Prunier, G. (1995). The Rwanda crisis: History of a genocide. New York: Columbia University Press
Rouhana, N. N., & Kelman, H. C. (1994). Promoting joint thinking in international conflicts: An Israeli-Palestinian continuing workshop. Journal of Social Issues, 50, 157–178CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rummel, R. J. (1994). Death by government. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction
Staub, E. (1974). Helping a distressed person: Social, personality and stimulus determinants. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 7). New York: Academic PressCrossRef
Staub, E. (1975). To rear a prosocial child: Reasoning, learning by doing, and learning by teaching others. In D. DePalma & J. Folley (Eds.), Moral development: Current theory and research. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum
Staub, E. (1978). Positive social behavior and morality: Social and personal influences (Vol. 1). New York: Academic Press
Staub, E. (1979). Positive social behavior and morality: Socialization and development (Vol. 2). New York: Academic Press
Staub, E. (1980). Social and prosocial behavior. In E. Staub (Ed.), Personality. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall
Staub, E. (1986). A conception of the determinants and development of altruism and aggression: Motives, the self, the environment. In C. Zahn-Waxler, M. Cummings, & R. Ianotti (Eds.), Altruism and aggression: Social and biological origins. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University PressCrossRef
Staub, E. (1987). Commentary. In N. Eisenberg & J. Strayer (Eds.), Empathy and its development. New York: Cambridge University Press
Staub, E. (1988). The evolution of caring and nonaggressive persons and societies. In R. Wagner, J. DeRivera, & M. Watkins (Eds.), Positive approaches to peace. Journal of Social Issues, 44, 2, 800CrossRef
Staub, E. (1989a). The roots of evil: The origins of genocide and other group violence. New York: Cambridge University Press
Staub, E. (1989b). Steps along the continuum of destruction: The evolution of bystanders, German psychoanalysts and lessons for today. Political Psychology, 10, 39–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Staub, E. (1992a). Understanding and preventing police violence. Center Review, 6, 1 and 7Google Scholar
Staub, E. (1992b). Transforming the bystander: Altruism, caring and social responsibility. In H. Fein (Ed.), Genocide watch. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press
Staub, E. (1993). Motivation, individual and group self-concepts, and morality. In T. Wren & G. Noam (Eds.), Morality and the self. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
Staub, E. (1995). How people learn to care. In P. G. Schervish, V. A. Hodgkinson, M. Gates, & associates (Eds.), Care and community in modern society: Passing on the tradition of service to future generations. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
Staub, E. (1996). Cultural-societal roots of violence: The examples of genocidal violence and of contemporary youth violence in the United States. American Psychologist, 51, 117–132CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Staub, E. (1998). Breaking the cycle of genocidal violence: Healing and reconciliation. In J. Harvey (Ed.), Perspectives on loss: A source book. Washington, DC: Taylor and Francis
Staub, E. (1999a). The origins and prevention of genocide, mass killing, and other collective violence. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 5, 303-336CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Staub, E. (1999b). The roots of evil: Social conditions, culture, personality and basic human needs. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 3, 179–192CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Staub, E. (2000). Mass murder: Origins, prevention and U.S. involvement. In Encyclopedia of violence in the United States. New York: Scribner's
Staub, E. (2000). Genocide and mass killing: Origins, prevention, healing and reconciliation. Political Psychology, 21, 367–382CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Staub, E. (2002). Understanding and preventing police violence. In S. Epstein & M. Amir, (Eds.), Policing, security and democracy. Huntsville, TX: Office of Criminal Justice Press
Staub, E., & Pearlman, L. A. (2001). Healing, forgiveness and reconciliation after genocide. In S. J. Helmick, and R. L. Peterson, (Eds), Forgiveness and reconciliation. Radnor, PA: Templeton Foundation Press
Staub, E., & Rosenthal, L. (1994). Mob violence: Social-cultural influences, group processes and participants. In L. Eron & J. Gentry (Eds.), Reason to hope: A psychosocial perspective on violence and youth. Washington DC: American Psychological Association
Steiner, J. M. (1980). The SS yesterday and today: A socio-psychological view. In J. Dimsdale (Ed.), Survivors, victims and perpetrators: Essays on the Nazi Holocaust. New York: Hemisphere
Stover, E., & Nightingale, E. O. (1985). The breaking of bodies and minds: Torture, psychiatric abuse and the health professions. New York: Freeman
Sykes, G. M., & Matza, D. (1957). Techniques of neutralization: A theory of delinquency. American Sociological Review, 75, 664–670CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tajfel, H. (Ed.). (1982). Social identity and intergroup relations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Tajfel, H., Flamant, C., Billig, M. Y., & Bundy, R. P. (1971). Societal categorization and intergroup behavior. European Journal of Social Psychology, 1, 149–177CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, F. (Ed.). (1983). The Goebbels diaries, 1939–1941. New York: Putnam
Tec, N. (1986). When light pierced the darkness: Christian rescue of Jews in Nazi-occupied Poland. New York: Oxford University Press
Toch, H. (1965). The social psychology of social movements. New York: Bobbs-Merrill
Toynbee, A. J. (1915). Armenian atrocities: The murder of a nation. London: Hodder and Stoughton
Trumpener, U. (1968). Germany and the Ottoman Empire, 1914–1918. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
Turner, J. C. (1987). Rediscovering the social groups: A self-categorization theory. New York: Basil Blackwell
Volkan, V. D. (1988). The need to have enemies and allies. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson
Von Maltitz, H. (1973). The evolution of Hitler's Germany: The ideology, the personality, the moment. New York: McGraw-Hill
Wilson, P. J. (1980). Conflict, stress and growth: The effects of war on psychosocial development among Vietnam veterans. In C. R. Figley & S. Leventman (Eds.), Strangers at home: Vietnam veterans since the war. New York: Praeger
Wyman, D. S. (1968). Paper walls: America and the refugee crisis, 1938–1941. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press
Wyman, D. S. (1984). The abandonment of Jews: America and the Holocaust, 1941–1945. New York: Pantheon
Zimbardo, P. G. (1969). The human choice: Individuation, reason, and order versus deindividuation, impulse, and chaos. In Nebraska symposium on motivation. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press

Accessibility standard: Unknown

Accessibility compliance for the PDF of this book is currently unknown and may be updated in the future.

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×