Manifestations of Helping Behavior among Preschool Children in a Laboratory School in the Philippines

Manifestations of Helping Behavior among Preschool Children in a Laboratory School in the Philippines

The study investigated helping behaviors in two laboratory preschool classes in a university in the Philippines and the contexts in which these behaviors were displayed. Using non-participant observation, 34 children between 3 to 5 years old were video recorded at least one hour for nine days spread across a period of one month during unstructured class activities. Storytelling sessions followed the observation to identify the ideas children have about helping. Data were organized using event samples and grouped according to Bar-Tal’s categories of (a) sharing, (b) aiding, (c) comforting, and (d) giving. A total of 380 incidents of helping behaviors were noted. Findings suggest that aiding (55.79%) is the most displayed helping behavior followed by sharing (34.21%), giving (8.16%), and comforting (1.84%). The helping behaviors were mostly self-initiated (52.37%) and routine-based (32.9%) rather than adult- (13.32%), peer-initiated (10.53%) or modeled behaviors (0.79%). These findings are attributed to the socialization of the class routine and rules at the beginning of the semester.