Fear of Negative Evaluation Affects Helping Behavior: The Bystander Effect Revisited

The effect of shyness and fear of negative evaluation (FNE) on helping behavior was examined. Eighty-three students participated in the experiment. Their individual shyness, FNE, and self-monitoring scores were collected prior to participation. During the experiment, participants had the opportunity to help a female confederate in either a social or nonsocial situation. An interaction of FNE and condition was found to be marginally significant. In the social helping condition, participants who helped showed no difference in FNE scores versus those who did not help. However, in the non-social condition participants who helped had lower FNE scores than those who did not help. The findings are framed in accordance with the bystander effect. A marginally significant interaction of gender and condition was also discovered. Males helped at the same rate as females in the non-social condition, but helped more than females in the social condition. This provides support for the social role theory of helping, based on the socially conditioned mores that a man should help a woman in need. There is extensive research on shyness, fear of negative evaluation (FNE), and helping behavior as individual topics, but very limited knowledge coneeming how these constructs are interrelated. Because shyness, FNE, and helping behavior are prevalent in many facets of everyday life, it is important to investigate the relationship between these variables. In the present study, the effects of shyness and fear of negative evaluation on the likelihood of offering help were examined within a self-presentational paradigm.