How hurry and kindness don’t mix
We all know the feeling: rushing through life while trying to be kind. But hurry undermines kindness more than we realize. You’re racing to get your kids to school on time and instead of patiently helping them tie their shoes, you snap. You notice someone on the street struggling with their bags, but you’re rushing to catch your train. Your partner wants to share something about their day, but your head is still stuck in work emails.
You value kindness. You want to be patient, empathetic, helpful. And yet, in the rush of everyday life, your behavior tells a different story.
Psychologists have a name for this: the Good Samaritan effect. It is one of the clearest demonstrations of how much the situation — especially time pressure — can override even our strongest values and intentions.
📌 TL;DR
- We like to believe kindness is a matter of personality or values, but context shapes behavior more than intentions.
- The famous Good Samaritan experiment showed that being in a hurry drastically reduces helping behavior (10% vs. 63%).
- Follow-up research suggests it is not callousness but conflict: urgency and perceived importance push us to prioritize tasks over people.
- Today’s culture of constant busyness and notifications risks eroding empathy and connection.
- The way forward? Creating more space — in our own lives and in the lives of those around us — so there’s room for kindness.
The classic Good Samaritan study
In their now classic study, John Darley and Daniel Batson (1973) invited seminary students to deliver a short talk. Some of them were even assigned the parable of the Good Samaritan itself — the biblical story of a traveler who stops to help a stranger in need.
On their way to the lecture hall, the students encountered a man slumped in a doorway, clearly in distress. Surely, one would think, theology students — primed with a story about kindness — would be the first to help.
But that’s not what happened.
The single biggest predictor of whether students helped was whether they were in a hurry:
- In the high-hurry condition, only 10% stopped to help.
- In the no-hurry condition, up to 63% did.
- Religious beliefs, values, or even the topic of their talk? They made no significant difference.
Even future priests, about to give a talk on compassion, walked past a man in need when they were pressed for time.
The follow-up: are people truly that mean?
Five years later, Batson and colleagues revisited the question: was this a sign that people become callous under pressure, or was something else at play?
They suggested another explanation: conflict. When time pressure and task importance are high, people face a split-second choice:
- Do I help the person in front of me?
- Or do I help the experimenter who told me to hurry?
The data confirmed it. When the task felt urgent and important, only around 10% helped. But when there was no urgency and no high-stakes task, helping rates shot up to 50–80%.
“Our pace of life may have serious implications for prosocial behavior. We may become increasingly callous, less likely to recognize others’ suffering or to care about reducing it.”
Batson et al (1978)
In other words it’s not that people fail to help because we don’t care about kindness, but because our priorities get hijacked by a (false) sense of urgency.
How hurry influences kindness today: constant notifications steer our behavior
These studies are around fifty years old — yet they feel more relevant than ever.
We live in a world of permanent urgency:
- Emails that demand immediate replies.
- Slack, Teams, or WhatsApp messages streaming in 24/7.
- Social feeds where everything feels like breaking news.
This constant sense of hurry undermines kindness as it narrows our attention. Just like the seminary students, we may end up ignoring the people closest to us — our children, our partners, our colleagues — not out of cruelty, but out of misplaced urgency.
At the same time, people increasingly long for empathy, connection, and real human presence. Perhaps the lesson is this: instead of waiting for “others” to be kinder, we need to create more space in our own lives, and in the lives of those we influence (our teams, our children), so that kindness has room to emerge.
How to slow down to make space for kindness
The Good Samaritan effect is a reminder: values and intentions are not enough. We need systems and contexts that make kindness easier. Some starting points:
- ✅ Create breathing space: avoid cramming every hour of your day. When everything feels urgent, kindness gets crowded out.
- ✅ Design your environment: turn off notifications, add buffer time in your agenda, and make space for conversation.
- ✅ Pause deliberately: even a few extra seconds to really notice what’s happening can shift your behavior.
- ✅ Name the conflict in your head: ask yourself, “What is more important right now — being on time, or showing patience to my kid?” Often, the latter matters more.
- ✅ Put your phone away: I keep a charging station in my kitchen. During meals, bedtime routines, and at night, my phone stays there. It removes the temptation to check “urgent” messages that aren’t urgent at all.
These small shifts don’t just help us be kinder in the moment. They also set an example for those around us.
🔗 Related articles on the Behavioral Times
- How can you close the gap between wanting and doing? (The intention–behavior gap)
- Why information alone doesn’t change behavior
- The power of habits
📚 References
- Darley, J. M., & Batson, C. D. (1973). “From Jerusalem to Jericho”: A study of situational and dispositional variables in helping behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 27(1), 100–108. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0034449
- Batson et al (1978). Failure to help when in a hurry: Callousness or conflict? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 4(1), 97–101. https://doi.org/10.1177/014616727800400120
Closing thought
The Good Samaritan studies show us that kindness isn’t only about personality or values. It’s about context. If hurry undermines kindness, then slowing down is the first step to more humanity.
If we want more kindness in the world, we need to slow down, make space, and design lives where kindness has a chance to thrive.
Florien Cramwinckel
