Diffusion of Responsibility

Diffusion of responsibility — one of several cognitive mechanisms of moral disengagement and a related concept to displacement of responsibility and the bystander effect — describes individuals who feel less personal responsibility to act or intervene in a situation, assuming others in group settings will take action instead. For example, not stepping up when a person collapses in a crowded public space, believing others will help even if no one does. Contributing factors include group size,  ambiguity of the situation, and perceived expertise of others present. Social psychologists John Darley and Bibb Latané have extensively studied diffusion of responsibility, proposing this mechanism as a possible mediator of a number of group-level phenomena, such as: bystander effect, choice shifts, deindividuation, social loafing, and reactions to social dilemmas.