Oh! I need to open the door myself?!

When I was studying, I lived in a university residence. There was an external gate that had to be unlocked before you could enter the compound. Walking back during a cold British night, both I and my then flatmate started to take our keys from our pockets a little before we reached the gate and she commented that there was an optimal time to do this so that your keys are ready before you reach the gate but that your hands are out in the cold for as short a time as possible.

I started to notice that most people do this whenever they are arriving home, when they are walking to their car, or whenever there is a door they know they will need to unlock.

Strangely (at first glance, at least), this doesn’t seem to happen at the Ministry of Finance in Lesotho, where I work. Time and time again I observe people walking right up to door and then stopping. Dead. Then there is a brief search inside a pocket or (hand) bag before the card that is used to unlock the door is removed.

This seemed like rather curious behaviour to me, and I started to ponder why this differs from the behaviour I had noticed in Europe. I have two potential explanations:

1. People do not think in advance. Or rather, the cultural perception of time – and in particular, the (immediate) future – is different;
2. People are hoping someone else will open the door for them.

Neither of these ideas is controversial, but both have some interesting implications. That perception of time differs across cultures is fairly well researched (see here and here for a couple of papers I found with more references and here for a short summary). It is also obvious to most ‘Westerners’ who have lived in Africa that the ‘pace of life’ and general urgency is somewhat different.

Economically, the first explanation would suggest one of two things:

• Either time is a lot less important including, presumably, the time spent working, with the result that there is less production, so there are fewer goods and services to consume, so people are poorer. This is a perfectly fair social choice to make: on average, Europeans choose to work fewer hours than Americans, and prefer to take the extra leisure time rather than the extra goods and services that working longer hours would have produced. But I have to wonder whether the time spent searching a bag for a key-card is not simply lost time.
• Or, the future – even the immediate future – is very heavily discounted. That is, even at the moment I am approaching the door, I care so little for the time that will arrive in just a few seconds, that I do not think about it. This has severe economic consequences when it comes to investing in the future.

Whilst the first explanation is cultural, the second is more linked to incentives. The door is a busy one, and there are often people walking in and out. Why make any effort yourself when someone else will make the effort for you? This is very rational behaviour, and was given some support when, a few days ago, I walked to the door behind a lady who had stopped right in front of it with my card ready in hand. She thanked me and explained that there is always someone else to open the door for her, so she doesn’t need to do it.

I smiled at her and remembered that, walking to the University compound, I and my flatmate both took out our keys ready to open the gate.