Door Holding Helping Behavior Observations

Door Holding Behavior

I was interested in investigating if there was a gender difference in the helping behavior of door holding. I operant defined door holding behavior as opening the door and holding it for the person behind the door holder. I observed from the third floor study area of the Business building by the bridge to the Humanities and Social Sciences buildings on November 27th and 29th from 12 to 1pm. The observed consisted of UTSA students and staff that ranged from approximately 18 to mid fifties.

On November 27th twenty eight people were observed in a one hour that completed door holding behavior. Out of the twenty eight people observed completing the behavior fifteen of them were female, since that is only half the first days observations were not very conclusive. I also noticed that I include people who appeared to be in groups in my observations as singular accounts. I should have counted groups as a different category, because door holding in a group is less likely to be a random act of kindness and more likely a way to keep the conversation going and the group together, as a result of this I changed my way of recording groups on my next observation.

On November 29th I observed from the same spot again, attempting to keep some continuity to my observation. This time I observed thirty three occurrences of door holding behavior. Out of the thirty three occurrences of door holding behavior fifteen were female, eleven were male, and seven were groups; the difference between male and female was not very conclusive for individuals. However I did notice that in groups that if a male was present he would hold the door for the group, so the does suggest that there is an actual gender difference in door holding behavior, but more observations would need to be done.

If I were to complete this observation again I would do it for longer, with an assistant and I would observe record both door holding behavior and non door holding behavior. I would also examine group door holding behavior on a separate occasion with a more refined definition of the behavior.