Summary
A person’s socioeconomic status directly affects their state of complete well-being. Those from higher socioeconomic groups have better health than those from lower socioeconomic status. Some of the socioeconomic factors include nutritional status and health-seeking behavior (Lindemann & Stolz, 2021). Moreover, according to the Grossman model of health, education status directly impacts a person’s health. These factors affect individuals’ survival when faced with a disaster.
This study aims to find out why some people survived while others perished after the Titanic accident. People died because of their cabin locations, general health statuses, and social relations. The paper will accomplish that by analyzing the quantitative and qualitative data from the testimonies of survivors of the tragedy. However, there is an inherent bias in the study population because it is made up of survivors only.
Discussion
The total number of people on board the Titanic was 2,207. However, only 710 survived, while more than 1,178 boats could have saved a greater number of people (Jeacle, 2021). The survivors were classified by age, which was numerical data (Jeacle, 2021). The passengers’ classes were the first, second, and third classes. The time the passengers got a chance to board the boats was included.
The data represented the order of boarding the lifeboats. This data type is not statistically analyzable, but inferences can be deduced. The majority of people who survived were from the first class because they got the preference in access to the lifeboats.
In addition, more people in first-class cabins survived than those in third-class cabins. The cabin’s structure would explain why some people survived while others perished. The people could be more protective of the effects. The researchers used the SPSS software (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences) to conduct the data analysis.
Data Overview
This section will focus on data obtained from the narrations of the survivors of the tragedy. It will concentrate on the testimonials from the survivors of Boat One. Most people from the first-class cabins reported getting information about the accident earlier than those from other cabins.
Moreover, the rescuers gave them priority when accessing the lifeboats. Therefore, this showed an aspect of bias based on the social status of the passengers. The crew of the ship preferred saving the first-class passengers because they had probably paid more money.
Most of the respondents reported letting their wives and daughters access the lifeboats before them. This could probably explain why most of the survivors were female (Jeacle, 2021). During the stampede, to gain access to higher areas of the boat, most of the weak members and females were hurt and left behind. Finally, most people from the third class and those in the engine rooms did not survive because they were trying to save the boat while others got saved.
The qualitative and quantitative data have shown that many socioeconomic factors influenced the survival rates. Some data from the twenty boats’ survivors showed that most were from well-to-do families. Those passengers from the third class were in only two out of the twenty boats. Each boat had one person to guide, and he was a crew member. This was a possible explanation for the higher number of people from first-class survival (Dilisi, 2022).
Another confounder would be the nutritional status. Those from the first class were nutritionally well-built and healthy at the start of the journey. This gave them an advantage over the rest of the passengers because they could survive the harsh conditions longer until they got rescued.
This study is, however, subject to bias because few people survived, and the data were collected from them. Some had recall bias and did not want to be reminded of what happened. To overcome this challenge, the study used records from the police and the marine rescues. However, accessing this information was difficult, and some documents were lost (Dasgupta et al., 2021). The people on the Titanic were from different countries, and this caused bias in the interpretation of the data.
The research has shown that more lifeboats should be added to the big ships. They should be equally distributed among the different classes on the ship. The various cabins should be made safe for everyone to improve survival in case of an accident. Policies and rules should be made to ensure equal treatment of people in case of an accident. A person with a higher chance of survival should be given priority instead of saving those from a particular social class.
Conclusion
In conclusion, socioeconomic factors are related to survival and perishing in the Titanic accident. This was depicted by the higher number of survivors coming from economically empowered people; gender differences also played a significant role. Most survivors were female, probably due to cultural reasons at the time.
Although the research had some bias, the results are not entirely related to the people’s opinions. Quantitative data is an almost accurate representation of the survivors. Furthermore, this study design will almost always have a bias. When these factors are tackled, future accidents will have lower death rates.
References
Dasgupta, A., Mishra, V. P., Jha, S., Singh, B., & Shukla, V. K. (2021). Predicting the Likelihood of survival of Titanic’s passengers by Machine learning. IEEE Xplore. Web.
Dilisi, G. A. (2022). The sinking of the R.M.S. Titanic: A case study in thermal inversion and atmospheric refraction phenomena. The Physics Teacher, 60(1), 11–14. Web.
Jeacle, I. (2021). The gendered nature of valuation: Valuing life in the Titanic compensation claims process. Accounting, Organizations and Society, (99),101309. Web.
Lindemann, A., & Stolz, J. (2021). Teaching mixed methods: Using the Titanic datasets to teach mixed methods data analysis. Methodology, 17(3), 231–249. Web.