Self-esteem, Attentiveness, and Helping Behavior

False feedback on a personality test was used to pro duce temporary loss in self-esteem. Pilot data indicated a dif ference in self-reported explanations of failure to help; nega tive feedback subjects were significantly more likely than posi tive feedback or no feedback subjects to report not noticing an emergency. In the first experiment negative feedback subjects were found to be significantly less responsive to a white noise than positive and no feedback subjects. In the second exper iment, in addition to the feedback manipulations, half the sub jects were exposed to a helping situation in which the confeder ate called attention to herself by making a slight noise. The remaining half of the subjects were not exposed to a noise. Re sults indicated that the noise manipulation had no effect on helping in the positive and no feedback groups; helping was sig nificantly lower in the negative feedback group when no noise occurred.