Groups, Violence and Bystander Behaviour: Understanding Pro-Social and Anti-Social Behaviour in Public Places Seminar

In this talk I will describe a program of research that explores how the social psychology of group processes can be used to tackle anti-social and violent behaviour in public.  I will begin by describing a systematic, frame-by-frame analysis of 42 episodes of public aggression captured on a single city centre CCTV surveillance system. I will show that, contrary to popular belief, third parties are more likely to conciliate than escalate violence.

I will also outline the pattern of third party behaviors that are most likely to prevent aggression from becoming violence. I will then describe a series of experiments carried out in a fully immersive virtual environment in which participants are exposed to a violent altercation between life-sized avatars in a virtual pub. By manipulating the social identity relationships between perpetrator, victim and bystanders we explore the effects of group processes on willingness to intervene. I will conclude with some observations about how group processes can be harnessed to develop effective public order interventions.