Chapter 12: Prosocial Behavior

Why Does Prosocial Behavior Matter?

  • People who report more prosocial behavior:

    • More meaning and purpose in life

    • More happiness and life satisfaction

    • More popular in grades 3-8

    • More attractive to others

    • Social structure relies on prosocial behaviors

    • It seems like the “right” thing to do 

Altruism

  • Behavior by an animal (including humans) that is not beneficial to or may be harmful to itself but that benefits others of its species

  • Types of altruism, based on evolutionary theory:

Type of Altruism

Target of Altruism

Kin altruism

Genetic relatives

Mutualism

Members of the community or team

Reciprocal Altruism

People who can help you

Competitive Altruism

Anyone, but in the presence of rivals

Psychological Motivations for Altruism

  • Egoism-Motivated Altruism

    • Engaging in prosocial behaviors because it benefits you to do so

    • Financial rewards, social capital, and increased self-worth

  • Empathy-Motivated Altruism

    • Engaging in helping behaviors to reduce the needs of others, without consideration of costs or benefits to oneself

    • Altruism can be motivated by empathetic concern, an emotional response that occurs when we see others in need

Batson et al. (1981)

  • Participants witness a distressed student receive a series of electrical shocks

  • Participants told they’d watch one (easy escape) or two trials (difficult escape)

More evidence that empathy predicts altruism

  • Healthcare workers are more likely to sanitize their hands when reminded that it keeps patients safe than when reminded that it keeps them safe (Grant & Hoffman, 2011)

  • Empathy for the most vulnerable in the population associated with social distancing in the US, UK, and Germany at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic (Pfattheicher et al., 2020)

  • Altruistic kidney donors show more activation in bilateral anterior insula than controls when watching others experience pain (Brethel-Haurwitz et al., 2018)

Benefits of Giving Support

  • Toddlers aged 19 to 23 months, coded as happier when giving treats than when receiving them (d = 1.12)

    • Also, happier when giving away one's own treats compared to giving away experimenter’s treats (d = .46) [ Aknin et al., 2012]

  • Older adults (N = 1,118) who reported giving more help also reported being physically healthier

    • To relatives or non-relatives

    • Controlling for: age, gender, ethnicity, education, income, marital status, size of social network, functional mobility

    • Neither receiving help nor reciprocity is related to health

  • Older married adults (N = 846)

    • Prosocial behavior = unpaid hours providing instrumental support to people with whom they don’t live

    • Stress is related to an increased risk of death in the next 5 years

    • Prosocial behavior is related to decreased risk of death

    • Prosocial behavior moderated the association between stress and death

  • Providing support related to psychological benefits even for those with recent trauma (Frazier et al., 2013) and after the recent loss of a spouse (Brown et al., 2009)

Compassionate Goals

  • Self-image goals: focus on constructing and maintaining images of the self

  • Compassionate goals: focus on supporting others and ensuring that you aren’t causing harm

    • What is good for others is also good for you

    • More satisfying relationships

    • Tend to be held in higher esteem by others

    • Related to decreases in symptoms of depression and anxiety over 10 weeks in college students (Crocker et al., 2010)

    • In those diagnosed with depression or anxiety disorders, associated with fewer daily symptoms and perceptions of support from others over 10 days (Erickson et al., 2017)

Moral Elevation

  • Warm, uplifting feeling that you get when you see unexpected acts of human goodness, kindness, courage, or compassion

  • Provides evidence of morality, human decency, pride, community, etc.

  • Opposite of social disgust

  • Described as being touched, inspired, or moved

  • Promotes prosocial motivation

  • Related to psychological growth and compassionate goals following trauma (Tingey et al., 2019)

Singularity Effect of Identifiable Victims

  • Tendency to have stronger reactions to and more willingness to help an identified individual as opposed to a group with the same need

  • People tend to be relatively insensitive to the scale or scope of need/crisis

  • Participants with collectivistic values are less likely to demonstrate this effect

    • More likely to contribute to the group than those with less collectivistic values

    • When printed with collectivistic values - using we, us, ours- more likely to donate to a group than an individual