In his new book on how to reduce gun violence, Jens Ludwig tells the story of a good Samaritan experiment in classical social sciences (the book is Uuforgiving Places: The Unexpected Origins of American Gun Violence).
In a standard study in the 1970s, a team of social psychologists enrolled 40 students from Princeton Theological Seminary and asked them to walk across campus towards another university building to talk about the parable of a good Samaritan. In the biblical story, a man is taken away and left injured on the side of the road. He is then ignored by a passing priest, and then taken care of by the migrant Samaritans. In this study, subjects met people (the researcher’s plant) (people who were not moving or closed their eyes). However, only 40% of seminary students stopped to help those in need. As researchers observed, “On several occasions, seminarians literally stepped on the victim while he was in a hurry.”
What set the subjects apart for helping those who were not? Was it something about their personality, like the level of their religious devotion? It turns out that religious subjects are not explained how they have not explained who stops help and who stops. What is the most important factor? Whether the subject was in a hurry. Some were randomly assigned so that they were said to be slow to talk, while others were not. Much fewer people were in a hurry (10%) than those who were not in a hurry (63%). The lessons of the bad Samaritans are not about the effects of rushing themselves. It’s more common. To help with action, situations were far more important than people.
Many of us live in a hurry for most of our days. But those who are in a hurry are often distracted. To the extent that they don’t respond to what is in front of them in the way they actually like, that is, if people are not in a hurry, they like (or don’t act). Longtime famous UCLA basketball coach John Wooden has been quoted as saying, “Don’t hurry, but not hurry.”
Ludwig’s theme regarding gun violence is that things like 80% of gun violence are not just the immediate economic benefits of psychopaths and assassinations like robbery, like the film, but instead about situations where debate breaks out between the two. Ludwig argues that there are often windows of short time where debate escalates to violence past key points. Finding ways to reduce the chances of escalation or interrupting the 10-minute window will reduce the chances of one person dying and the chances of another person coming to prison. Solutions are often less about conflict than distractions. So those walking through the tunnel of rage, or those close to doing so, can detour to another path. Ludwig does not argue that this is a complete or complete solution to gun violence, but it is simply that there is substantial evidence from urban design and violence prevention programs that show actual benefits.
Ludwig recognizes that this prescription does not satisfy those who believe that solutions to gun violence include laws and regulations restricting gun use, and that a policy of more serious punishment against shooters does not satisfy those who believe that people will consider and retreat people in heated rage. He writes: “For better or worse, if 400 million US firearms aren’t just disappearing anytime soon, and if major national gun controls are unlikely in the near future, advances in gun violence can come up with ways to reduce people’s tendencies to harm others.
For some previous posts on the lack of evidence of which policies could reduce gun violence, see here and here. For those who want to know more about the study of good Samaritans, the quotes are Darley, John M, and C. Daniel Batson. “‘From Jerusalem to Jericho”: A study of situational and temperament variables in aiding behavior. ” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 27, no. 1 (1973): 100–108.
