If you saw a small child standing in the road about to be hit by a car. And you knew if you saved the child you would be struck by that car. What would you do?

You’re being somewhat melodramatic with your definition of deep human psychology, worded as I’d expect from documentaries or fiction. Also a term I’ve never heard before, and cannot find. There closest I can is “Depth psychology”, the study of the relationship between the conscious and unconscious mostly using psychoanalysis. It’s mostly about mental disorders, which I guess if you had one may lead to your claimed suicidal altruistic tendencies.
As for my education, I take it you’ve been corrupted by the American system. Here we aren’t just given a book and told to remember everything, then tick a few boxes on a test, we’re sent out into the world to find all the facts we need from as many sources as we can, to ascertain the most commonly accepted truths or facts, (or current leading opinions) taking into account factors such as date, region as well as the content, and then to use this experience to conduct our own series of psychological experiments, (kept at a relatively rudimentary level, as we can’t perform experiments like Stanley Milgrams on fellow students; something about potentially scarring them emotionally for life.) The only way I have a biased education is if every one of the sources I found has been manipulated by someone. The only things my teachers actually taught me were referencing systems, and a bit on research methodologies.
Apologies if I seem a bit confused here, I went out to eat after the last paragraph, and lost my chain of thought.
As to human behaviour, we have the genetic, natural stuff, innate behaviour, that’s mostly geared towards self-preservation, along with a bit of social stuff like mating rituals, and preservation of genes, like mating, and maternal instincts for one’s own children. (Also “glitches” to affect children they’re frequently exposed to.) We have innate learning patterns, such as acclimatisation to oft repeated stimuli with no consequence. That one I’ve forgotten the name of where we memorise and map our surroundings, and so on.
Then we have learned behaviour, from repetition or repeated exposure, classical and operant conditioning, which can override instinct.
As it is, you seem to hold an idealised view of humans, or at least yourself, as wholly selfless, altruistic beings. An obviously flawed viewpoint. A look at the world from the eyes of a realist shows you that. While it’s plausible you may have performed they acts you claim you have (I find it highly unlikely, not due to anything specific to you) and if you have you’re an exceptionally altruistic human with an obvious death wish. (Or to clarify a lack of self-preservation.)
(Wish I’d had time to go through, and refine/finish this post, but I have to go now.)

Well, you're good, and I'm uninteresting in arguing with you on such a redundant point as this. However, you have, I'll easily admit, provoked a few thoughts which I am, again, compelled to tell you.
Firstly, It's highly unlikely that I've been "corrupted by the American system" seeing as I've never in my life, set foot in a standard classroom. I am wholly self educated, and recount only what I've either learned or felt personally, or heard from a good source.
Yes, I have a tendency towards melodrama, I'm just naturally of a rather theatrical type. I apologize for that.
The "deep" psychology I was referring too, is normally called Primal Therapy, or, and I'm more familiar with this one, Deep Feeling Therapy.
The best example of this is the book called The Primal Scream, by Arthur Janov, who is the creator of this particular branch of psychology. It typically deals with the concept of repressed trauma's dating back to early childhood or even before birth, and how that consistently controls what we do and how we do it, all through our adult lives. A mental snapshot, if you will, of our birth. I believe it's commonly called an "imprint"
Unfortunately, Arthur Janov himself was superbly screwed up when he wrote this book, so he also isn't entirely accurate, and also there are some massive flaws in his approaches. Deep Feeling Therapy is an offshoot of this , but much more personalized.
Both my parents underwent the latter for some fifteen years when they had three children and realized they were about to make the same mistakes as their parents did. They stopped several years ago when their therapist wasn't able to "contain" them anymore. Since then they've spent nearly every weekend advancing themselves, and doing much the same as you described above, except from the heart, and not from the head. My dad calls it "Musing" and it really does work. Whether the person involved can withstand the aftereffects or not, is yet to be seen. But my dad can have a complete stranger in primal screams, rooted in birth trauma, in less then twenty minutes.
Of course, afterwards, when they part ways, people have a tendency to blame him, or hate him, for complicating their lives.
I quite agree with them on that count, I can't do anything now, or think anything, without wondering if there's some other reason why I'm thinking or doing it.
You say I have an idealized view of humanity. Yes and no. I hold everything around me in a very high expectation. However, few people could be more aware of how sick we are.
I DO NOT hold myself to be selfless, or anything of the kind. In fact, I've made being selfish a good thing, an art even. Nobody is more important in a day to day situation, than I am.
There are times though, when the scales tip the other way, and I'm never unaware of the danger.
As far as my apparent lack of self preservation instinct. I know what I can and can't do, very well, and I'm typically more likely to er on the conservative side than put myself in an unnecessarily dangerous position.
There are some exceptions, where I choose to either accept, or ignore, the danger.
But that's easy for me. I'm far from being fearless or thick when it comes to these things.
I don't know what most people would do in the sort of situation that this debate was started over, you're probably right, most would be so shocked that they'd fail to act.
But just say for a moment, that there was time to both register the danger, and weigh the odds. In that kind of situation, how many people would still stand and watch?
I wouldn't, regardless of how the scales tip, because a child's life means more to me than mine does, and that's just it.
If there was a stray dog, or kitten, or something of the kind, stuck in a twenty foot deep hole in the ground, and I could fit, I could never walk away from that, I would find a rope, and have someone help me get it out, no matter how bad the hole may be.
I'm just like that.
Horse stuck upside down in a fence, it could kick you and kill you before you even realize the danger, I'm still going to go in there.
And that's not even a human child.
I'm not arguing about what everyone else would do. I'm just saying that I know what I would do, and I'd do it even without thinking. It isn't about some misplaced pride, or empty ideal, I've already done it. Albeit, on a smaller scale.
I have high expectations, and a perfectionist viewpoint on myself, and the world I inhabit.
That's all.
In case you didn't see my other post, I'd like to out this up too.

Reflex: An action that is performed without conscious thought as a response to a stimulus.

Instinct: 1 An innate, typically fixed pattern of behavior in animals in response to certain stimuli: "predatory instincts".
2 A natural or intuitive way of acting or thinking: "rely on your instincts".

So I was using the correct terms. Just perhaps not in the way you were thinking them.

Anyway, I have to go too. I must say I haven't had such an interesting debate here on sodahead in about a year, maybe more. It's refreshing.
Good day to you.