In this exercise, you will experience and explore the challenge of creating knowledge about social life through an important research method used by sociologists: experiments. You can also work with the scientific process, the steps through which sociologists and other scientists conduct their investigations.
This experiment explores whether attachments between people affect whether help is offered. Two people are attached when they like each other or when they have affection for each other. Sociologists consider attachments crucial for social life and have explored their importance in many areas of social behavior, such as conversion to religious groups and deviant behavior.
Instructions
Decide on some objects to be dropped, such as books, notebooks, coins, or whatever. Several or more items should be dropped.
Drop the objects in front of a stranger as the stranger passes by you. Do so in a way that appears natural.
Record whether the stranger helps you pick up the dropped items.
Drop the same objects in front of a friend as they pass by you. Do so in a way that appears natural.
Record whether your friend helps you pick up the dropped items.
Do the experiment on at least seven people with a mix of strangers and friends.
Present your results by answering the questions in this assignment. The independent variable will be the degree of attachment to the passerby (classify as friend or stranger). The dependent variable will be whether or not the person helped (classify as yes or no).