Categories: All - helping - cultures - behavior - community

by Francesca Davis 6 years ago

210

Levine

Research explored the willingness of individuals to assist strangers in various situations across different cultures. The study used three scenarios: a blind person needing help at a curb, an individual with a visible leg injury dropping magazines, and a confederate dropping a pen.

Levine

Floating topic

Levine

Conclusions

Overall levels of helping across cultures are inversely related to a country's economic productivity

Analysis of the results

There was no significant difference in males and females in levels of helping behaviour
There was a consistency of behaviour across the three catagories.
Overrall helping rate ranged from a high of 93% in Rio De Janiro (Brazil), to a low of 40% in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia).

Method

Blind person
C was dressed in dark glasses with a cane. Just before the light turned green, they would walk up to the crub and wait for someone to help.
Hurt leg
C would have a heavy limp and clearly visible leg brace, would drop a pile of magazines 20ft away from pedestrian. 253 men and 240 women helped.
Dropped Pen
Confederate was 10-15ft away frm ps. C would "accidentally" drop his pen behind hiim 214 men and 210 women approached.

Aims

To identify characteristics of communities that are more or less likely to help strangers
To see if helping strangers varied across cultures
To see if tendency to offer non-emergency help to strangers was the same in different situatons where people needed help