Comments on: What is Courage?

By: Jeremy (PsyBlog author)

Jeremy (PsyBlog author) — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 07:57:00 +0000

Hi Chris, thanks for your comment - it's always great when the author of the study drops by!

BTW, if you've got any other studies you'd like to recommend for PsyBlog then please do leave a comment or drop me an email. Thanks

By: Chris Rate

Chris Rate — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 20:51:00 +0000

Thanks for posting comments on my article! I'm happy to see the discussion of courage is alive and well ... not left solely to the pontifications of the likes of Plato, Aristotle, and Mencius.

I'd be more than willing to discuss research (mine or others) on courage with those interested.

As for the critiques on my sample ... quite fair.

Lastly, I do think that Dr Grumpus is on to something. There may very well be a difference between how people make the "distinction between assessing the factors that prompted courageous behavior by one's self and courageous behaviors by others." As my studies have been about people's implicit theories of courage, the focus has been on the evaluation of courageous acts demonstrated by others ... not self-reflection and self-evaluation.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 16:56:00 +0000

Courage is best defined by Spielberg's "saving Private Ryan"..."Doing the RIGHT thing no matter how you feel"

By: NARASIMHA

NARASIMHA — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 21:40:00 +0000

I see courage as the ability to meet your challenge and perform a task in spite of fear. It is not the absence of fear but the ability to conquer fear in the performance of tasks.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 22:47:00 +0000

I think that lack of courage derives from a reticence to 'take command.' That we have a place and role to fit and that to step outside that role is to be insolent. The power of a firm command delivered with a sense of authority is frequently more than one instinctively motivated, can resist.

Courage is a firm resolve to act according the the need regardless of the rules.

By: Jeremy (PsyBlog author)

Jeremy (PsyBlog author) — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 17:30:00 +0000

Will, in answer to your question, I'm pretty sure they didn't because they tried to avoid the vignettes being formulaic. And including a firefighter rescuing someone from a burning building is probably formulaic.

Benjamin, sounds like you'd be interested in 'expected utility theory' - have a google if you've not come across this...

On whether courage always includes fear point I'm still undecided. Probably some future research there.

By: Helen

Helen — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 06:27:00 +0000

It is stander-by effect.

By: Dr. Grumpus

Dr. Grumpus — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 21:40:00 +0000

There is a distinction to be made, I think, between the operationalizing "courage of self" and "courage of the other."

That is, I sense that there is a distinction between assessing the factors that prompted courageous behavior by one's self and courageous behaviors by others. The first will naturally be more cognitively grounded, whereas the other would be more behaviorally grounded.

One's schemas (scripts, to be precise) also are critically important, and perhaps they are the reason why those in "courageous" professions often disabuse themselves of that label: It's what they do, and it is often second nature to them.

Therefore, I would disagree with Matt on one point in that for some, fear may be present during courageous acts, whereas for others, it would be less so.

I would recommend the following books for interesting perspectives in courage: The Tending Instinct (Shelley Taylor) and The Denial of Death (Ernest Becker). And, of course, there is the classic work of Latane & Darley (although they took a unquestionably more negative approach in their work -- "Why don't people help" -- with the reasons now well documented).

By: Benjamin

Benjamin — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 21:37:00 +0000

Perhaps courage relates to a conflict of conviction against percieved probably of success and the cost of failure. I would be interested in learning more about the research in this field.

By: Will

Will — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 18:33:00 +0000

Matt, I might argue that the relevance of courage in the first story wasn't in the ill-advised hand gesturing, but rather the lack of courage the other passengers showed in preventing, or at least trying to prevent, the incipient beating.

Also, I'm curious about the idea of discounting courage among those who deal with trouble professionally that you raised early in the article, Jeremy. Do you know if any of the short stories used had police/fire/military people as protagonists?