Who are the heroes? Characteristics of people who rescue others

Abstract

Heroic rescuing behaviour is a male-typical trait in humans, and it is possible that life risking acts represent a costly signal, showing that a rescuing male has good underlying genetic quality. Previous research has shown that males with low status occupations are more frequent rescuers than males who have higher socio-economic statuses. This study looked at news archives of local papers in the UK in order to discover what kind of characteristics rescuers possess. It was found that males were highly more likely to rescue than females were, and that a typical rescuer was a low status male rescuing another male. Males with low socio-economic status were more likely to rescue in all the contexts (fire, drowning, violence and traffic accidents). Socio-economic status and heroism are discussed in relation to the evolutionary theory. It is suggested that heroism could be a condition dependent life history strategy and could be related to steep future discounting.