Altruistic Behavior: Comparation of Men and Women in Indonesia

Andy Gunardi

1,2

Character Building Development Center, Information Systems Department, Bina Nusantara University, Jakarta 11480,

Indonesia.

PhD Student in Psychology, Atma Jaya Catholic University, Jakarta 12930, Indonesia

Keyword: Altruistic behavior, gender, Western

Abstract: Indonesia is a country having a lot of cultures, religions and well known as a tolerant and help each other.

They have an adage, that’s “berat sama dipikul dan ringan sama dijinjing” (Indonesian are living together

and helping each other). If the idea is correct, we might say Indonesian are altruistic people. Because of

such phenomena, researcher is interested in proving the idea. Researcher differentiates between women and

men to compare the two. According to the theory before in the West Countries, women are more altruistic

than such men, so that the question may arise is, “is that the same in Indonesia?”. To measure such

behavior, researcher finds a tool called Adapted Self Report Altruism Scale (ASRAS) in Indonesia by

Researcher. Researcher spreads ASRAS forms online to the university students in Bina Nusantara who are

seventeen to twenty-four years old and adults who are twenty-four and above years old. Having such

analyzed research, the results can explicitly between men and women. The main purpose of this research is

to have the level of altruistic scale for Indonesian and which one is more altruistic than the other.

1 INTRODUCTION

Indonesia is a country known as high social level of

population. Indonesian live together and build

connection each other as a community. It can be

seen from a low level of governmental structure,

they are rukun tetangga (bringing peace each other

in small area of residents) and rukun warga

(bringing peace each other in a few of rukun

tetangga). These kinds of structure cannot be found

in other countries. The task of rukun tetangga is to

help neighborhood if there are dispute or conflict

each other and also to help family if they have

problem. The task of rukun warga is to facilitate a

harmony living around rukun tetangga.

Through those phenomena, researcher is

interested in finding the level of altruistic behavior

of Indonesian, especially between men and women.

If the concept is so, Indonesian are high in altruistic

level and next question is that “which one is more

altruistic than the others; men or women?”. This

research is used as Adapted Self Report Altruism

Scale. The scale is adapted from SRAS by Rushton,

Chrisjohn and Fekken (1981).

Altruism is a topic that discussed in the context

of social behavior. People are questioning about

those who want to help and act sacrificing to others.

One theory said that such genetic is delivered from

one generation to the other generations (Hamilton,

1964). Richard Dawkins (1989) said that altruism

was derived from human being selfish behavior. He

quoted Hamilton theory that altruism is individuals

being selfish, make decision together to facilitate

and maintain selfish behavior among them. The

purpose was their personal interests (Dawkins,

1989).

The Dawkin’s theory is rejected by Gintis,

Bowles, Boyd and Fehr (2003). They, therefore, find

a theory about strong reciprocity. There is a

tendency doing good among people when they

experience the good act from the other people

(Gintis, Bowles, Boyd and Fehr, 2003). Long before

Gintis, Bowles, Boyd and Fehr (2003) found the

theory, Batson and Shaw mentioned there were

some people who were born naturally as altruistic

(Batson and Shaw, 1991). They have good

empathizing and willing to help others (Batson,

2011). Rosopa did a research about helping people

who actually did helping themselves (Rosopa,

Schroeder and Hatfield, 2013). This is different from

what Gintis said. Helping behavior was not caused

by reciprocity but by helping the others.

Gunardi, A.

Altruistic Behavior: Comparation of Men and Women in Indonesia.

DOI: 10.5220/0009999100002917

In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Social Sciences, Laws, Arts and Humanities (BINUS-JIC 2018), pages 11-15

ISBN: 978-989-758-515-9

Theory about altruism is developed in daily

context, such as what Jaffe did. He uses altruism in

punishment context. People who did wrongly are

punished by doing good for community. The

altruistic punishment can change norms in the

society (Jaffe, 2004). The other side, Saslow uses

altruism in the context of spirituality. She finds that

more spiritual the person, more altruism the person

is (Saslow, 2011). Through these theories, we can

say that prosocial behavior is not only moved by the

selfishness but also by the good heart of people and

by practice.

Women have higher level of altruistic than men

(Mills, Pedersen and Grusec, 1989; Fabes and

Eisenberg, 1998). Through their research, women

are easier to help because of the role of unifying

than men. Men are rather acting than unifying.

Women have tendency to be warm, social orientated

and sensitive to relation and men have tendency to

gain self-control and success (Eagly, 1997; Eagly

and Wood, 2012; Eagly and Wood, 2016; Bierhoff

H W 2002).

1.1 Definition of Altruism

There are various theories about altruism and in this

case, researcher will focus on some relevant to the

research. Batson defines altruism as an act of

helping others, even if doing so involves some cost

to them (Batson and Shaw, 1991). Simmons defines

altruism as a feeling or tendency to do good to

others, even at the expense of personal gain

(Simmons, 1991). He mentioned 4 factors, those are

willingness to do things to enhance the welfare of

others, not one’s own, voluntary, intentional

involving helping others and expecting no reward.

In the handout book of social psychology defines

altruism as a tendency to help even so doing that

will take personal cost (Aronson, Wilson, Akert and

Sommers, 2015).

Fuentes defined altruism as prosocial behavior

that satisfied the observable requirements of

altruistic behavior plus the following criteria: The

behavior benefits another person; It’s voluntary; the

beneficiary of the act is well defined; the performer

of the act does not expect to receive any external

benefit from the act (Fuentes, Lopez, Etxebarria,

Ledesma and Apocada, 2014).

Through those theories researcher defines

altruism as individual tendency doing good, freely,

to the others, even if it involves a cost to the helper

and the helper does not expect in return of what he

or she has done (Batson and Shaw, 1991; Simmons,

1991; Aronson, Wilson, Akert and Sommers, 2015)

1.2 ASRAS 2018

Adapted Self Report Altruism Scale is designed to

measure altruistic scale for Indonesian. This test is

adapted from Rushton, Chrisjohn and Fekken (1981)

who firstly found consistency of the altruism in all

field of life. The previous theory said there were no

consistency (Hartshorne, May and Maller, 1929). He

proved through correlation test, altruism in variety

fields was +.5 and +.6 (Rushton, Chrisjohn, and

Fekken, 1981). The Self Report Scale was tested to

Western Ontario University students and the results

were significant. He compared the test with the other

instruments such as Educational Testing Service

(ETS) and Nurturance Scale of the Personality

Research Form (PRF) (Jackson, 1974). The results

were the same. SRAS could be compared to the

other measurements.

In 1992 SRAS was developed in India. The

results was SRAS could be adapted to India culture

(Khanna, Singh and Rushton, 1993). In 2009 SRAS

adapted by Peter Witt and Chris Boleman in

America. The tool has been used by CYFAR Life

Skills Project, Youth Development Initiative and

Texas A&M University (Boleman and Witt, 2009).

2 METHOD

This research uses quantitative method and the

participants are from Bina Nusantara university

students and adults. They are strictly selected

because of according to Newman and Newman the

later adolescence (about 18-24) can be differentiate

gender, autonomy from their parents, and

internalized morality (Newman and Newman, 2008).

The further steps of life which are adulthood and old

age can be more mature to do altruistic act.

Participants from Bina Nusantara University are

eighty-one students and they are seventeen to

twenty-four old year old. The adults are 128 people

and they are twenty-five and above year old.

The SRAS by Rushton, Chrisjohn, and Fekken,

(1981) is adapted to Indonesian context by

researcher. Researcher used sample about 309

participants and find the tool was established. The

original items are twenty and after adaptation

become thirteen items. The process of adaptation

using experts to translate the language from English

to Indonesian and Indonesian to English and also

expert judgement. After that researcher used SPSS

24 and Amos 24 to find reliability, EFA and CFA.

The results are Cronbach Alpha .837; corrected

items .3 and above; communalities extraction .4 and

BINUS-JIC 2018 - BINUS Joint International Conference

above; RMSEA .56; AGFI .897; CFI .958; GFI .934.

The conclusion is this test can be used for

Indonesian.

The participants from Bina Nusantara university

students were asked to fill ASRAS questions using

their own cellular phone in the class. The adults

were asked to answer the questions using media

social (WhatsApp group). One person asked to send

to the other person using their own cellphone. The

total participants are 309 (Try out ASRAS: 50 men

and 50 women; Field ASRAS: 104 men and 105

women). There are no missing data in this research.

Data were collected using google form and

analyzed them using SPSS 24. This research is

applied research. The objective is comparative (to

compare score or value between two variables). The

purpose of this comparation is to capture the real

situation of altruistic behavior between men and

women.

The independent variables are gender: men and

women. While dependent variable is altruistic

behavior. According to ASRAS there are three

factors: they are helping with cost; care; and

empathy. To measure the dependent variable,

Researcher use ASRAS 2018. The method to

compare men and women, researcher use t-test from

SPSS 24

3 RESULTS

3.1 Interpretation

According to descriptive statistic using Kolmogorov

Smirnov the data are normal. They can be seen

through table 1.

Table 1: Test of normality.

Kolmogorov-Smirnov

Gender Statistic df Sig.

men .067 104 .200

women .071 105 .200

There are 209 participants and the data that can

be used are Kolmogorov-Smirnov which has

significant both for men and women α = .2 >.05.

After making sure that the data are normal,

researcher uses independent t test. The results can be

seen the following table.

Table 2: Test for equality.

Levene's

Test for

Equality of

Variances

t-test for Equality of

Means

F Sig t df Sig.

Equal

variances

assume

1.58 .21 -3.76 207 .000

Equal

variances not

assume

-3.76 204,80 .000

Base on Levene’s Test α = .210 > .01. It

indicates that the data is equal variances assumed. It

means t-test α = .00 < .01. The assumption that can

be used is there different level of altruistic behavior

between men and women.

Table 3: Group statistics.

Gender N Mean

Std.

Deviation

Std.

Error

Mean

Total

Men

104 41.07 9.216 .903

Women

105 45.66 8.388 .818

The table 3 shows us that women are more

altruistic than men. It can be seen through mean

value. Men are 41.07 and women 45.66.

3.2 Discussion

Indonesia is assumed as high level of altruistic

behavior. It can be observed through the low

governmental structures. They are rukun tetangga

and rukun warga. According to the results such

measurement using ASRAS 2018, we find data the

low altruistic level (score below 50) is 14.3%,

medium level (score between 50 to 70) is 40.7% and

high level altruistic behavior (70 and above) is 45%.

Table 4: Score of altruistic behavior.

N/score Under 50 50 to 70 70 to 100

30 14.3%

85 40.7 %

94 45%

According to the score, the image of high level

prosocial behavior, especially altruism is in stake.

Altruistic Behavior: Comparation of Men and Women in Indonesia

There is a threat that the tradition to help each other

could be reduced from time to time. If Indonesian

are altruist people the high score (70% and above)

must be more than 50%. This score is a warning for

people in Indonesia. If they want to keep as a nation

which is social people who want to help each other,

they need to keep the tradition and also develop the

pro social behavior.

The results of t-test indicate that women are

more altruistic than men. The theory in the west

about this, is the same (Mills, Pedersen and Grusec,

1989; Fabes and Eisenberg, 1998), the nature of

women which is unifying and more social person

give contribution to be more helpful. Women are

more communicable than men. The communication

reflects the level of emotional closeness (Palchykov,

Kaski, Kertész, Barabási and Dunbar, 2012; Kamas,

Preston and Baum, 2008).

In the context of participants, even women are

higher score than men the gap is not too high (men’s

mean is 41 and women’s mean is 45). Perhaps the

role of women as defining by Mills and Grusec

(1989) bring the differences. Asih and Pratiwi did

the research about the pro social behavior and they

found there were no differences between two (Asih

and Pratiwi, 2010). The conclusion that can be taken

is even women are more altruist than men, the gap is

not too high.

3.3 Limitation

There are a lot of factors that can change Indonesian

from altruism to selfishness. The research of

altruism in Indonesia mentions that high level of

altruism is 45%. The factors that can decrease and

increase the altruistic behavior need to define. For

doing so, researcher is aware of the limitation of this

research. The future research is needed, especially

how to intervene people in Indonesia to raise the

altruism and to wake up the tradition of helping and

tolerancing each other.

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Altruistic Behavior: Comparation of Men and Women in Indonesia