IIt was the early morning of January 1 last year when Colin McGarva dove into a flooded river in Worcester to rescue an unconscious woman. McGarva said he didn’t think twice about the risks to himself, or the devastating loss his newborn son would suffer if he was swept away by the fast-flowing icy waters.
“I didn’t stop thinking because the instinct – the immediate reaction – was to help someone in need,” he said. “Someone’s life is important. Helping is just something you have to do.”
The concept of heroism was widely discussed last week after the mass stabbing attack on a high-speed train from Doncaster to London. While initial reports spoke of panic and confusion as passengers – some wounded and bloodied – passed through the carriages, stories of heroism soon emerged.
Samir Zitouni, an LNER employee, was the most famous. He was taken to hospital after putting himself in danger to save the lives of passengers, and was praised by police and the Transport Minister for his “immeasurable courage”.
Transport Minister Heidi Alexander declared: “There are people alive today who would not be alive… without his actions.” But his family said: “For us, he was always a hero.”
Is there a hero inside each of us? Experts in bystander intervention say there are; And we are all more likely not to act with selfless heroism in moments of acute threat.
Professor Stephen Reicher, an expert in collective behavior at the University of St Andrews, said: “The idea that people are panicking and screaming to get out is a Hollywood fantasy.”
“It’s special that people stay and help each other,” he said. “We found that during the July 7 Underground attacks and the 1999 attack on the Admiral Duncan pub in London, people looked out for each other even though they feared other bombs.
He added: “In our own research into the Leytonstone tube attack in 2015, there was an astonishing level of spontaneous coordination by bystanders: some directed others away from danger. Others distracted the attacker. Others confronted the attacker. Each was able to act because of the others. Heroism was a feature of the group, not just the individual.”
Professor Clifford Stott, a specialist in crowd psychology and group identity at Keele University, agrees. He said recent research showed that “bystander apathy” was a myth. Instead, strangers often work together in emergency situations in highly sophisticated unity.
“What recent research shows is that the public is very good at protecting themselves and that the heroic acts that make headlines are actually natural tendencies inherent in all of us.”
He said it reveals something very positive about the human condition – but it also suggests that society would benefit from enhancing and harnessing this natural ability by helping people feel empowered to take charge during emergencies.
“This will become increasingly important because of the broader challenges society will soon face – at the very least, there will be many more mass climate emergencies,” he said. “We need to strengthen local resilience and build infrastructure within communities that helps them organize and help manage this incentive that people have to intervene.”
Professor John Drury, a social psychologist who specializes in studying group behavior at the University of Sussex, agrees. “Authorities arriving at emergency sites need to support and facilitate people’s strong and natural inclination to come together and help each other,” he said.
The language used by police and other first responders was subtle but key to this, he said, noting the use of positive, unifying language: “Talk about ‘the community’ rather than ‘the public,’ about ‘us’ and ‘us.’” “Focus on fostering that feeling of connection within the group you are speaking to, and between yourself and that group.”
Dr Jill Harrop, who leads the bystander intervention program at the University of Worcester, said many organizations were already actively working to build a bystander culture.
“We are seeing this happening now through bystander intervention training in schools, colleges, universities, the police and even the NHS,” she said. “We’re slowly but surely creating communities of active spectators. And that’s great.”