I first became interested in personal interactions in high school. As the group
psychologist for my circle of friends, I was exposed to many different type of
people and how those people dealt with situations. Also, I was fascinated by why
some people(like myself) feel compelled to do nice things for other people like
picking up a dropped pencil to bringing an ill person hot soup. I noticed that
the same guys were always asking me the same questions. Usually the questions
revolved around girls, such as how to get them, what to do once you got them,
and how to keep them. It mesmerized me that these guys were completely
uninformed about women while many of my other friends were having no trouble in
the same area. Over time I saw that the guys that were asking all the questions
had not had much interaction with the opposite sex except during school. I
wondered if there was some correlation, and so I am proposing this study. My
first article involving prosocial behavior was done in Norway by Moncrieff
Cochran and Inge Bo. Their focus was to evaluate the influences of parents,
peers, and other network members on the pro- and antisocial behavior of
antisocial behavior of antisocial boys. The Stavanger study was set in the city
of Stavanger for several reasons. A recent population spurt has triggered an
increase in the amount of negative youth behaviors, and so it seemed to be a
prime opportunity. The two junior high schools used in the study were selected
because they contained a exemplary mix of lower middle-, middle-, and upper
middle-class families. Cochran and Bo found that " . . .time spent by
parents with their boys as central to maintaining low levels of antisocial
behavior." They also saw that the neighborhood environment that the boys
resided in was at least as powerful a predictor of antisocial behavior. My
Hypothesis is that if adolescents participate in coed extracurricular
activities, then they will be more likely to show prosocial behavior to both
genders. I then propose the following correlational study to test my hypothesis.
The population of interest is male and female adolescents, age 12 to 17. The
selection process of the subjects would be to pick several single gender groups
in a specific area, such as Private schools and Boy Scouts Troops. Next would be
to select some coed groups in the same area such as bible study groups and
school clubs like biology club and drama club. The independent variable in my
study is whether or not the subject participates in coed or single gender
extracurricular activities. This variable would be operationalized by In this
study the dependent variable is amount of prosocial behavior exhibited by the
subject. It would be operationalized by With the permission of the adult leaders
of the groups, the adolescents involved, and their parents we would proceed by
observing the groups at their respective meetings. After observing how There is
some evidence for closer relationships between same-sex as opposed to opposite
sex siblings.