The idea that a shipwreck women and children are rescued first is a myth. According to experts  who analyzed 18 marine disasters and found that, in general, men prefer to save themselves.

The sinking of the Titanic - where 70% of women and children on board were saved compared with 20% of men - is a rare exception to the rule and virtually created the myth of "women and children first," according to a study held by the Elindera Erixson and Swedes Mikael Oscar from University of Uppsala, Sweden, and published in Atlas of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

In most cases, the captain and crew tend to worry about their own safety first, and the men aboard tend to save himself twice against women and the rate of children is even worse.

The researchers analyzed data from maritime disasters from 1852 to 2011, including 15,000 passengers and crew of more than 30 different nationalities.

The analysis did not include the Costa Concordia tragedy, which occurred last January and whose captain was much questioned for abandoning the boat before the 4200 passengers were evacuated. 32 people died in the wreck.

Study shows that the behavior of the captain Francesco Schettino does not seem so unusual.

Historical data show that the crew members' survival rates are higher than for passengers and that only nine of 16 captains went down with their boats, "notes the study.

Cases in which the captain asked the passengers and crew to give priority to women and children were those with better survival rates in general.

In the case of Titanic, the captain ordered the women and children were first placed safely and there were reports of officials who fired to a man who disobeyed this order.

Women survived longer than men in only two studies of shipwrecks, the Titanic in 1912, and Birkenhead, a British ship that ran aground in the Indian Ocean in 1852.

Considerably fewer women than men survived 11 shipwrecks, and there was no clear evidence of a difference in the remaining five cases studied.

In British shipwrecks in particular, the study revealed that women always have it worse than men, despite the order to save women and children make up more frequently in British ships.

"This contrasts with the notion that British men are more gentlemen than men of other nationalities," says the study.

"What happened on the Titanic seems to have wrong ideas about human behavior during a disaster," the investigators conclude.