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When an ocean liner starts taking on water, what governs whether it’s “women and children first” or “every man for himself”? According to a report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [see: http://bit.ly/clUjR2, lead author Benno Torgler], men’s altruistic versus self-serving behavior depends on how quickly the ship sinks.
On April 14th, 1912, the Titanic hit an iceberg and took nearly three hours to slip beneath the waves. Some 1,500 people perished. And the survivors tended to be female or young. The Titanic’s women were over 50 percent more likely to make it than were the males, and children had a 15 percent better chance of being rescued than adults.
But kids were not as lucky on the Lusitania, which three years later sank just 18 minutes after being hit by a German torpedo. In this situation it truly was survival of the fittest, with healthy young males being the most likely to live to tell the tale.
While passengers on the Lusitania panicked and scrambled for survival, scientists say that those on the Titanic had enough time to override their animal survival instincts and do the chivalrous thing.
—Karen Hopkin
[The above text is an exact transcript of this podcast.]
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7 Comments
Add CommentPlease correct your typographical error, "Atruism", in your title and other places!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, I agree! Please correct the misspelling in the title. I want to tweet this, but don't want to send a misspelling out down the line!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis article seems to overlook some details. The faster sinking ship had less time and presence of mind to get out the lifeboats and other life saving equipment. Therefore, more people of all ages and both genders were plunged into the water rather than being able to get on a lifeboat, even if the men altruistically herded the women and children to the lifeboats anyway. At that point it just becomes a matter of who can stay afloat in the water the longest, which would be the men, logically.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAmusingly enough, the typo sorta makes sense, though I'm guessing it was inadvertent. Depends on whether the writer meant "Altruism" or perhaps "A Truism" when alluding to the old saying - "Women and children first"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnother sweeping generalization from an N=2 study. Is the term "social science" an oxymoron? Gee, can I think of any other alternative explanations? Like maybe you need to be physically fit to survive a sudden ship sinking? Like maybe young males were most likely to stay afloat without life jackets? Like maybe 18 minutes doesn't provide a lot of time for altruism to have constructive results? Or maybe physically fit people have more resistance to hypothermia? Or maybe the males were less prone to panic and therefore more able to save themselves? Since the ship sank in mid-afternoon, were more men on deck, and therefore closer to safety, at the time? Did women's clothing styles tend to impede them from swimming or staying afloat?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI really have yet to see that old adage applied in real life to begin with. 1..look at tapes after any natural disaster and you see gangs of young men pushing to front over women and children..you see young males doing most of looting etc. and getting in front of and robbing women. See present day news.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this2. Look at any history of churches and see women burned first.
3. Look to Taliban and see women and children used as front line shields for the men..never mind other abuses
4.etc etc
this saying is mans' (human) attempt at looking unrealistically at self and wishing we really were like that.
I also think men will follow other mens altruism if OTHER men are doing it. Sort of 'saving face' when other men are looking.
I don't for one minute believe it is somehow ingrained at all.
One of my teachers, specialising in Tuberculous patients care, Dr. Jose Alix-Alix, told us the story on how he lost his best friend. Both were in an elevator, and suddenly, the cabin dropped under the full speed gravity was able to produce, towards the basement. When the cabin arrived to the bottom, Dr. Alix best friend was sitting on his shoulders
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