Abstract
Not only prosocial behavior as well as the circumstances when people feel distressed are diverse, but also the action that people chose is different even in the same situation. The idea of "helping strategy" explains how people decide what actions to take when you help others. The main purpose of this study is to clarify that there are differences in helping strategies between students in elementary school and university. Additionally, the correlation between helping strategies and personal characteristics (help-seeking performance and self-esteem) was investigated. The questionnaire survey was conducted in 262 participants (89 elementary school 4th grade, 83 elementary school 6th grade and 90 university students). They were asked to read three stories and then to answer the questions on each story. The result showed that the ideal behavior in the same situation were significantly different between elementary school students and university students. In addition, there were correlation between help strategies and help-seeking performances. It indicates how people have helping strategies may change during developmental process, and also suggests that judgement for helping strategies are affected by cognitive development and environmental change. Moreover, the results from investigation of relationship between helping strategies and help-seeking performance explained that people who are interpersonal dependency tended to help others directly. On the other hand, people who are independent were more able to choose whether to help or not depending on occasions. In previous studies, it has been only argued the relationship between the prosocial behavior and each circumstance. However, our result indicates that it is important to consider helping strategies based on developmental status and personal characteristics. This finding may be potential cornerstone for future moral education and communication training.
