Week 9 - Prosocial Behavior

Question 1

Altruism

Answer 1

– behaviour that is aimed at benefiting another person

Type of prosocial behaviour

Can be motivated by personal egotism – motive to pursue personal gain or benefit

Can also be motivated by or “pure” empathy – an emotional response to the perceived plight of another person

Other contributors to altruism are collectivism valuing the group above oneself, and principlism, usually described as moral integrity

Question 2

Types of Altruism
Reciprocity‐based altruism

Answer 2

– helping behaviour motivated by likelihood of reciprocity

An egoistic type

Some think this isn’t altruism - requires the benefits to the helper to outweigh their costs over the longer term if it is to be sustained

Question 3

Types of Altruism
Care‐based altruism

Answer 3

– helping behaviour motivated by feelings of empathy or care for recipient

Connection or relativeness

An empathy type

helper being willing to take on personal cost to help a close friend.

Question 4

Types of Altruism
Kin‐based altruism

Answer 4

– helping behaviour directed toward family ◦ Spans the gap between egoistic and empathy

egoism and empathy to some extent - closer personal relationship is often present, perhaps making the helper desire to ease the helpee’s distress, but at the same time some egoistic protection of genes may be involved in the motivation

Question 5

Egotism

Answer 5

– perhaps one of the most influential human motives, o pursue some sort of personal gain or benefit through targeted behavior.

Helping person gets reward or praise
Helping person avoids societal or personal punishments for failing to help.
Helping person avoids distress - escape a sense of guilt for not helping when we step in and lend a hand to a needy person

Question 6

The Empathy Motive and the Empathy– Altruism Hypothesis

Answer 6

Egotism cannot account for all altruism

Empathy leads to greater likelihood for helping

Can be moved by empathies

Question 7

Correlates of Altruism
Positive emotions

Answer 7

Being in a positive mood stimulates altruism, altruism stimulates positive mood

Even when in negative mood, altruism helps self‐regulate negative emotion

Openness and agreeableness; honesty, humility

Question 8

Correlates of Altruism
Altruistic acts make us happy

Answer 8

Dunn et al., (2014) gave students either $5 or $20 and told to spend it either (a) on selves or (b) on others

Those who spent $5 on others were happiest!

Question 9

Correlates of Altruism
Eudaimonia

Answer 9

– part of the positive feedback loop -

helping and well-being such that people who feel happy are more likely to help others, and, in turn, helping others seems to further increase well-being and lower negative affect.

Related to Broaden and Build Theory

Question 10

Correlates of Altruism
benefits drop when?

Answer 10

benefits begin to drop when one puts too much strain on personal resources of time and money

Question 11

Correlates of Altruism
Compassion & empathy

Answer 11

Lab studies – compassionate people were likely to help the victim, but not likely to punish the transgressor

If they did decide to punish, the punishment was lighter

Question 12

Correlates of Altruism
Gratitude may be the catalyst

Answer 12

In a study that compared groups who were induced experimentally to feel gratitude versus those induced to feel happiness, researchers found that those in the gratitude group were most likely to voluntarily help others.

feel grateful = they may be more likely to view future helping behavior with a pay-it-forward

Question 13

Genetic and Neural Foundations Related to Altruism

Answer 13

Modest level of heritability for empathy

Prefrontal and parietal cortices are essential for empathy

Empathy requires the capacity to form internal simulations of anothers bodily or mental states
damage to the prefrontal cortex leads to impairments in appraising the emotions of other people

could be the result of trait-like behavior, as opposed to being state-like, leading people to act in this way more frequently

Question 14

Cultural Variations in Altruism
Gender differences in altruistic acts

Answer 14

More often found in females; data are consistent across ages

This is heightened by being high in agreeableness, conscientiousness ◦

Gender norms may expect altruism from women

Question 15

Cultural Variations in Altruism

Collectivism may be form of altruism (Batson et al., 2009)

Answer 15

Helping behaviour as part of the normed social structure

Japanese research shows altruism gets rewarded by mothers

Question 16

Parochial altruism

Answer 16

–altruism that is directed in a preferential manner towards members of one’s own social group

Question 17

Cultural Variations in Altruism

Religiosity and spirituality as related to empathy and prosocial behavio

Answer 17

Empathy related to religiousness

Altruism linked to spiritual experiences & spiritual cognitions

Nonreligious spiritual cognitions strongly liked to empathy ◦ “Ingroup favouritism “ – Galen, 2012 – this is likely egoistic

More altruistic toward those from same religious group

These relationships are not clear – related, but how?

Question 18

Volunteerism rates and economy

Answer 18

Generational and cohort effects

Economic recession in 2008 may have led to more altruism

Increase in volunteerism

Important use of time for those who lost jobs

As economy has gotten better, volunteerism has dropped

Question 19

Measuring Altruism

Answer 19

Hypothetical scenarios – e.g., read vignettes
Behavioural reports – e.g., magnitude of donations
Self‐report scales

Altruism scale
Compassionate Altruism Scale
Altruistic Personality Scale

Question 20

Cultivating Altruism
Egotism‐based approaches

Answer 20

Helping another person and feeling good are compatible!

Helping can lead to higher self‐esteem

Engage in community volunteer work

BUT there are still greater gains for helping without self‐interest

Question 21

Cultivating Altruism
Empathy‐based approaches

Answer 21

teach them to have greater empathy for the circumstances of other people

Interact more frequently with people who need help
This allows for learning and greater understanding
Empathy comes from affiliation
Ethnocultural empathy – developing empathy for people who are different ◦
Encourage children to develop wide and diverse social circles

Question 22

Cultivating Altruism
Values‐based approaches

Answer 22

The idea of “helpers”
found that in individuals who value prosocial acts so strongly that this becomes a piece of their identity
Volunteering is an important source of self‐ esteem

Heroes
These types of helping jobs, although they may tend to draw individuals who already value prosocial behavior to them, at the same time promote further development of prosocial qualities

Helping behaviour may be habit forming

Question 23

Gratitude
Robert Emmons’ definition of gratitude

Answer 23

Recognizing that one has obtained a positive outcome from another individual who behaved in a way that was
(1) costly,
(2) valuable to the recipient, and
(3) intentional.

Gratitude can come from another person’s actions or a nonhuman action or event - surviving a natrual disaster

Quality, not quantity is more important - not used to getting help - felt more grateful

Benefit finding – coming through a major problem and discovering benefits in that experience

Question 24

Correlates of Gratitude

Answer 24

Elevated positive emotions, vitality, optimism, hope, satisfaction
Physical, psychological, and spiritual well‐ being
Empathy, sharing, forgiving, giving one’s time
Reframing of negative events
Less depression
More meaningful life
“Gratitude is the poster child of positive psychology”

Question 25

Correlates of Gratitude
Strong social relationships

Answer 25

Forgiveness, attachment

Grateful people often have qualities that allow them to develop and maintain strong relationships with others, including a higher level of forgiveness

Question 26

Correlates of Gratitude
May assist with materialism – Influencers!

Answer 26

Decreased gratitude mediated relationship between materialism and resulting lower life satisfaction

Question 27

Cultural Variations in Gratitude
Cultural differences in expressions and reactions

Answer 27

US: “Thank you” - more positive reactions in US Samples compared to Korea
Korea: apology phrases like “I’m sorry” - prefer this
Which is better to save face

Question 28

Differences between groups - gratitude techniques

Answer 28

White Americans benefited more from gratitude as a happiness‐enhancing technique vs. Asian Americans

Gratitude journals increased negative feelings for South Koreans
Necessity of reciprocity (guilt)

Question 29

Cultural Variations in Gratitude
Religious identity

Answer 29

Positively correlated with gratitude

Interaction of religious commitment and religious gratittude - sensitive to being able to predict emotional well-being

Question 30

Cultural Variations in Gratitude
Gender experiences with gratitude may vary

Answer 30

Women appear to benefit from gratitude more and experience it more often and more comfortably

In families where social support is high, boys benefited more from gratitude

Likely a complex relationship among gender/gratitude/outcome

Question 31

Cultural Variations in Gratitude
Multiple cultural facets at play

Answer 31

Race, religious affiliation

Older African Americans and Mexican Americans reported being more grateful to God than White Americans

Question 32

Cultivating Gratitude
Gratitude journals

Answer 32

gratitude journals (i.e., recorded events for which they were thankful) were superior in terms of
(1) the amount of exercise undertaken,
(2) optimism about the upcoming week, and
(3) feeling better about their lives

Question 33

Naikan meditation in Japan

Answer 33

Meditate daily on three gratitude‐related questions:
What did I receive?
What did I give?
What troubles and difficulties did I cause to others?

Question 34

Gratitude Letter study

Answer 34

write a letter of thanks to someone for whom they were grateful and to then deliver that letter in person. They then compared youth in their study who were high in positive affect with those who were low in positive affect in terms of the effectiveness of this gratitude exercise.

Youth low in positive affect had greater gratitude increases and higher positive affect than youth already high in positive affect

So…it might be more important to cultivate gratitude in youth whoare lower in positive affect/experiences

Question 35

Cohort effects on gratitude

Answer 35

Gratitude toward first responders pre‐ and post‐9/11 terrorist attacks
Times of strife may lead to reprioritizing

Question 36

Measuring Gratitude

Answer 36

Ask people to list the things about which they are grateful

Qualitative – coding stories that people wrote about their lives

Behavioural measurement – e.g., times a child says “thank you”

Quantifying grateful responses
Self‐report scales

Multidimensional Prayer Inventory
Gratitude, Resentment, and Appreciation Test (GRAT)

Gratitude Adjective Checklist (GAC)
Gratitude Questionnaire (GQ‐6)

Question 37

gratitude - Neurobiological

Answer 37

activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (thought to be responsible for emotional regulation and other impulse control) and the medial prefrontal cortex (often associated with social cognition and decision-making) was found during the experience of gratitude

Question 38

Workplace Gratitude
2012 US Survey found that:

Answer 38

People are less likely to express gratitude in the workplace than anyplace else ◦

60% never or very rarely thanked anyone at work

Only 10% expressed gratitude at work on a given day

35% worried that expressing gratitude would lead co‐workers to take advantage of them

Yet this and other surveys also show that:
Saying “thanks” at work makes people feel happier and hearing “thanks” made them happier and more productive (by 50%!)

Only 18% felt expressing gratitude made bosses seem weak; 93% said grateful bosses were more likely to succeed

In general, “Thank you” from a supervisor boosts self‐worth and self‐ efficacy; gratitude recipients become more trusting and more helpful

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the number one reason why people leave their jobs is because they don’t feel appreciated.

Question 39

Gratitude and Health Care Providers

Answer 39

Medical students and other health care professionals often show a decrease in altruistic mindsets and empathy as they move through their educational processes

43% of nurses and more than half of physicians say they have struggled with BURNOUT.

Burnout is a complex state of being, generally defined by:
Emotional exhaustion
cynicism and callous attitudes towards others
a reduced ability to be effective in our jobs and relationships.

Burnout can be caused by feeling unappreciated.

Question 40

Gratitude Helps Health Care Providers
Study by Cheng, Tsui & Lam (2015):

Answer 40

Health care providers twice weekly wrote down things for which they were grateful.

RESULTS:
Reductions in perceived stress (28%) and depression (16%) in health care practitioners
“Such positive effects can also lead to an improvement in both productivity and quality of patient services.”

Question 41

The Societal Implications of Altruism and Gratitude
Empathy/Egotism and Altruism

Answer 41

Cannot always expect pure altruism – it’s okay to feel good about helping other people

Innocent bystander effect – diffusion of personal responsibility

Decrease in altruistic mindsets and empathy – due to burnout, frustration