Becoming a Better Person in Giving and Receiving Helps [Good Idea Series]

In this interesting article we will talk about how to become a better person in giving and receiving helps in our life. If we can give and receive helps in an easier way, we believe that our life will be happier and more enjoyable. We can use the knowledge we got from this article for our personal or work life.

Credit: 

The knowledge of this article is given by this best-selling book. Thank you so much for the author - Malcolm Gladwell.

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell

The Main Idea:

Then, let's read this interesting experiment taken from the book and take some positive lesson out of it ^^:
"Bystander Challenge Experiment" [1]
(An experiment which about "When people are in a group, responsibility for acting is diffused.")



Two New York City
psychologists — Bibb Latane of Columbia University and
John Darley of New York University — subsequently conducted
a series of studies to try to understand what they
dubbed the "bystander challenge". They staged/played emergencies
of one kind or another in different situations in order to see
who would come and help. (This is an experiment, friends ^^. So their intention is good and positive.)

What they found, surprisingly,
was that the one factor above all else that predicted helping
behavior was how many witnesses there were to the event.
They set up these two experiments:
1. They have a student actor alone in a room to play an epileptic act, and see how many people will help the student actor.
2. They seep out some smoke from under a doorway, and see how many people would report it.

In the first experiment, when there was just one person next door, listening, that person
rushed to the student's aid 85 percent of the time. But
when subjects thought that there were four others also
overhearing the seizure, they came to the student's aid only
31 percent of the time. In the second experiment, people who
saw smoke seeping out from under a doorway would report
it 75 percent of the time when they were on their own, but
the incident would be reported only 38 percent of the time
when they were in a group. When people are in a group, in
other words, responsibility for acting is diffused.

They
assume that someone else will make the call, or they assume
that because no one else is acting, the apparent challenge —
the seizure-like sounds from the other room, the smoke
from the door — isn't really a challenge.

What Are Some Positive Lessons That We Can Have From That Story?

1. For Giving a Help: Since we have already known the knowledge by now, giving a help to someone becomes easier. Thus if we see someone really in a need of help, let's help them without thinking too much eventough there are many people around. We will feel good about it and can inspire others to do the same. 
2. For Receiving a Help: Most of the time we will need a help or cooperation from other people. When we need a help or cooperation from more than one person, we may use this knowledge to ask for it in a more polite and sincere way.                                                Let say we want a help from our friends or teammates -- Jackson, Woody, and Jennifer -- through an email/sms. Instead of we email/sms them in a mass like "Hi Jackson, Woody and Jennifer, May you help me with this?",  you may email/sms them in a more personal way "Hi Jackson, May you help me with this?"; "Hi Woody, May you help me with this?"  and so forth. ( I think when we ask a help from someone specifically, it makes him/her feel more appreciated. And one more thing, we treat and respect them as a person very well.).

Mark Twain's Quote

Cheers.

Reference:
[1] Gladwell, Malcolm. "The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference". Chapter one, page 34-35.





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Bonus: What A Fun Thing! (For Math Lovers Only ^^ LOL)

Previoulsy, we have discussed it in Sociology's point of view. Now, we want to discuss it from Mathematics' Point of View. ^^  

Hypotesis: When we ask people for a help, it's better to ask them in a specific way.
Prove:
Let's Remember the story that you ask a help from Jackson, Woody and Jennifer.

First Method, you sms/email them in a mass way  "Hi Jackson, Woody and Jennifer, May you help me with this?"
 The probability of someone (Jackson/Woody/Jennifer) SAYS Yes to help you is 1/2 (because there are only two answers whether 'yes' or 'no').
The probability of someone (Jackson/Woody/Jennifer)  WANTS to help you is 1/3 (because there are three people in there).

So for example, The probabilty of Jackson WANTS to help you AND SAYS Yes to you is 1/3 x 1/2 = 1/6 (16%)
The Probability of Jackson and Woody WANTS to help you AND SAYS Yes to you is 1/3 x 1/2 x1/3 x 1/2 =  0.028 (2.8% even smaller hahahahaha).


Second Method, you sms/email them in a specific way "Hi Jackson, May you help me with this?"
 The probability of someone (in this case: Jackson) SAYS Yes to help you is 1/2 (because there are only two answers whether 'yes' or 'no').
The probability of someone (in this case: Jackson) WANTS to help you is 1 (because there is only one person in there).

So for example, The probabilty of Jackson WANTS to help you AND SAYS Yes to you is 1 x 1/2 = 1/2 (50%) ---> It's far higher compare to 16%, or approximately 3x times higher than first method with Jackson.


Thus from the mathematic's point of view, it is proven that when you ask for help it is better to ask to a specific person, one at a time.