Altruism Research Articles

Egoistic and altruistic claims in organic cotton apparel advertising

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of egoistic and altruistic values on purchase behaviors of organic cotton apparel. Our findings indicated that egoistic, social-altruistic, and biospheric values have a positive and significant effect on purchase intentions. In addition, when examining the effectiveness of egoistic and altruistic claims in organic cotton apparel advertising, we found a significant effect of advertising claim type on brand attitudes, product attitudes, and purchase intentions. Organic cotton apparel ads were the most effective in persuading consumers when they contain egoistic claims such as information about low price and personal health benefits. The findings suggested that altruistic claims alone may not be effective in promoting purchase behaviors and thus should be combined with egoistic claims. While it is widely accepted that altruistic considerations foster green apparel purchase behaviors, egoistic aspects of the purchase are often ignored. However, our findings showed that egoistic motives may play an important role in the purchase process of organic cotton apparel. Therefore, it would be important for marketers of organic cotton apparel to link such products to consumers’ egoistic considerations.

The influence of aggressive behavior on cooperation evolution in social dilemma

It has been found that some derived strategies that incorporate specific behaviors are conducive to altruistic behavior. In this paper, aggressive behavior is introduced into the game. An individual with aggressive behavior will attack a defector when he is betrayed by the defector, which may get some of the gains back for himself as compensation and cause losses to the defector, but it also carries risks. When the target of the attack is also aggressive, the conflict results in substantial losses for both parties. The model investigates the evolution of four strategies (Cooperation C, Defection D, Aggressive cooperation AC, Aggressive defection AD). The results show that there are multiple co-existing states of the four strategies. Under specific parameters, cooperators with aggression can deter defectors with their offensive capabilities. The presence of aggressive defectors oppresses the defectors and thus gives the cooperators a place to survive. However, the loss from conflict also limits the frequency of aggressive behaviors. To sum up, aggressive behavior provides the means for the maintenance of cooperation in the group.

Is the warm glow actually warm? An experimental investigation into the nature and determinants of warm glow feelings

Giving money to others feels good. In the past years, this claim has received strong empirical support from psychology and neuroscience. It is now standard to use the label ‘warm glow feelings’ to refer to the pleasure people take from giving, and many explanations of apparently altruistic behavior appeal to these internal rewards. But what exactly are warm glow feelings? Why do people experience them? In order to further our understanding of the phenomenon, we ran two studies: a recall task in which participants were asked to remember a donation they made, and a donation task in which participants were given the opportunity to make a donation before reporting their affective states. In both studies, correlational and experimental evidence converge towards the conclusion that, if the nature of the warm glow is straightforward, its source is multifaceted. Regarding the nature of ‘warm glow’, the pleasure people took in giving was mainly predicted by one particular positive emotion (‘joyful feelings’) and was indeed described by participants as a ‘warm’ sensation. Regarding the underlying psychological mechanisms, ‘warm glow’ feelings were elicited both by positive appraisals regarding the donor’s moral character and positive appraisals regarding the actual impact of the donor’s donation on the welfare of others. We discuss the implications of these findings for the role of positive emotions in explaining why people give.

Cultivating Altruism Around Computing Resources: Anticipation Work in a Scholarly Community

User research for scientific software can inform design and account for the unique concerns of academic researchers. In this study, we explored the user experience on a testbed for cloud computing research, CloudLab. Through 15 semi-structured interviews and observation, we observed the importance of time as a resource to system users. We observed CloudLab users strategically coordinating their time on the platform with other users, navigating the constraints of publication and other academic deadlines. Surprisingly, we found that this coordination may involve altruistic behaviors where users share time on CloudLab that had been allocated for personal use. In light of prior CSCW literature on how actors seek to harness time, we propose concrete opportunities for design interventions. Our strategy across all possible interventions is to increase users' awareness of the rhythms affecting their peers' platform use, allowing coordination based not just on knowledge of CloudLab reservations but also users' progress toward deadlines. The implications of this work inform the design of other similar cyberinfrastructure systems in science where users independently coordinate use of resources.

Understanding altruistic behavior: The joint role of prefrontal damage and OXTR genotype

Altruism is a type of prosocial behavior that is carried out in the absence of personal benefit or even at an expense to self. Trait altruism varies greatly across individuals, and the reasons for this variability are still not fully understood. Growing evidence suggests that altruism may be partly determined by the oxytocin receptor (OXTR) gene, which regulates the emotions underlying altruistic attitudes, such as empathy and trust. Neuroimaging and lesion studies have also implied several higher-order brain regions, including the prefrontal cortex, in altruistic behaviors. Yet the existing reports are contradictory and suggest that the top-down control exercised by the prefrontal cortex may promote both altruistic and self-interested behaviors and, thus, could obscure one's natural proclivity towards altruism encoded by OXTR.Here, we hypothesized that extensive prefrontal damage would result in an increased influence of the OXTR genotype on one's altruistic attitudes and actions. To test this hypothesis, we recruited 115 male combat veterans with penetrating traumatic brain injury to the prefrontal cortex and other brain regions, as well as 35 demographically matched control subjects without brain injury. Participants completed a self-report altruism questionnaire and were genotyped for four OXTR single nucleotide polymorphisms implicated in prosocial behavior, including rs53576, rs1042778, rs2254298 and rs7632287.Consistent with the previous studies, we found that individuals homozygotic for the G allele of rs53576 and rs7632287 were significantly more altruistic than carriers of at least one “vulnerable” A allele. Remarkably, in patients with prefrontal cortex damage, greater lesion extent was associated with significantly lower altruism scores in carriers of the A allele of rs7632287, but not in G-homozygotes, suggesting that significant disruption of the prefrontal cortex increased the influence of genetic polymorphisms on prosocial behavior. This study presents the first account of an interaction effect between the OXTR genotype and the location and extent of brain damage.

Performance contests and merit pay with empathic employees

AbstractThis paper studies the behavioral responses of employees who are endowed with empathic abilities to different institutional designs of incentive pay. Empathic abilities motivate altruistic behavior by sensing the other's feelings toward oneself. In performance contests, empathic individuals withhold effort, most (less) strongly when facing a non‐empathic (empathic) contestant. Effort levels of both non‐empathic and empathic individuals increase with a higher probability that the contestant is of their own type. By developing a theoretical model, our analysis contributes to understanding observed individual behavior in experiments and corresponding econometric evidence. With direct merit pay, effort choices only depend on the signaling quality of the performance measure. Individuals with stronger empathic abilities may shy away from performance contests to, instead, receive merit pay. If gender governs empathic abilities, setting incentives by performance contests cannot simultaneously ensure equal pay and equal opportunities.

Motivation Behind Conducting Altruism

In todays workplace, Generation Z (those born between 1990 and 2010) is gradually entering the labor market. This generation of young Chinese people has formed their unique social views and values due to the shaping and influence of their social environment. They show a high degree of self-awareness in their work, but at the same time have different degrees of dedication and a tendency of loafing on the job when faced with collective work. Therefore, based on this phenomenon as a starting point, this experiment attempts to explore the moral psychology of this group of people when they work in a group through a thought experiment interview. The results show that when many people show altruistic behavior, their motivation often comes from the balance of their personal benefits. There are also a few people willing to make greater efforts and trust to the uncertain collective work returns. However, when asked about the reasons behind the choices made in each experiment, interviewees often did not realize that their rational thinking was being affected by the moral intuition that they were accustomed to.

“We are all spiritual beings on a human journey”: gerotranscendence and generativity in the stories of South Asian American older adults

ABSTRACT Although one of the fastest-growing ethnic minority groups in the US, South Asians (SA) remain underrepresented in research, public health programs, and policies. South Asian American older adults, many of whom migrate later in life to reunite with their adult children, are particularly disadvantaged given the limited availability of culturally congruent health and social care, thus often adversely affecting their ability to age well. Furthermore, recent ethnogerontological research suggests that the meanings attached to aging well may differ across cultures. This qualitative study attempts to bridge this gap in knowledge by foregrounding the stories of SA older adults and their perceptions of aging well. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted with South Asian Americans 50 years and older (n = 32; 18 women; 14 men). Thematic analysis of the interview data showed that aging well for participants entailed (1) gerotranscendence, reflected in a less materialistic and more cosmic worldview, graceful acceptance of death, and an increase in altruistic behavior; and (2) generativity, wherein participants felt an obligation to preserve their role as cultural transmitters and keepers of traditional wisdom that they would pass on to the next generation. Religious faith and spiritual well-being facilitated, while communication gaps between generations acted as barriers to aging well. Increased volunteering opportunities, meaningful intergenerational engagement, and involvement in faith-based activities may enhance their subjective well-being and enable SA older adults to age well.

Exploring the impact of social media use on altruistic behaviours: an affordance approach

ABSTRACT Although researchers have devoted great effort to explore the antecedents of altruistic behaviours (a type of organisational citizenship behaviours), the important role of technical factors (social media) remains unclear. Drawing on social comparison and organisational support theory, this study explored how social media affordances influence employees’ altruistic behaviours from both positive and negative perspectives. In this study, 302 employees from organisations in China were surveyed. We found that social media affordances could facilitate employees’ perceived organisational support and social comparison of ability. Perceived organisational support positively mediated the relationship between social media affordances and altruistic behaviours. Although the evidence did not support the notion that social comparison of ability could directly dampen altruistic behaviours, a post-hoc analysis found that it could dampen the positive impact of perceived organisational support on developing altruistic behaviours. This study expanded previous research focusing on only positive or negative effects of social media use in the workplace by investigating the dual effects and the interaction effect in between. Here, we discuss the results and provide practical guidance for managers and organisations.

Searching for meaning during the pandemic: Delivery riders’ motivations in keeping the city of Wuhan running

AbstractThis article explores the motivations behind the moral code of delivery rider migrant workers who served in Wuhan, China, during the pandemic. Based on ethnographic research, we analyze how riders experienced the challenging situation of everyday work. Influenced by socialist and neoliberal contexts, the riders’ actions reflect diversified moral values combining individualistic and collectivist ethics. The precarious conditions gave rise to alternative visions and opportunities for the migrant laborers. They created a new mode of autonomy with economic rationality and emotional bonds to a geographical locality. Simultaneously, the riders’ identity was temporarily reshaped by both the public and themselves, creating responsibility and meaning. This act of strong “social responsibility” reconnected individuals trapped in the plight of the pandemic. This kind of altruistic behavior exemplified the process of people seeking meaning through their work.

Rights for me but not for thee: Restriction of human rights based on group membership and threat perceptions.

Policies aimed at limiting border crossing and influencing other cultural values have been enacted domestically and internationally in the name of security. However, do these decisions concerning such tradeoffs resonate equally across all groups? In two studies, we probe the moderating impact of intergroup threat on the inclination to restrict human rights. In Study 1, we employ a unique economic tradeoff model to directly compare the value of security with the rights of either citizens or non-citizens. In Study 2, we broaden these findings by examining whether support for infringements on the right to privacy varies among diverse groups. Across both studies, our results consistently show that an increase in intergroup threat corresponds to heightened restriction of rights, but only when contemplating individuals who are not citizens, such as non-citizens, residents, or foreigners. We propose future research directions that include promoting the concept of a global community and exploring altruistic behaviours associated with rights protection.

Choice of cooperation strategy under demand updating and altruistic behavior

The integration of logistics service supply chains to improve the service quality of has become the choice of many logistics integrator. This paper considers two common cooperation modes, namely, enabling cooperation and merger cooperation. Meanwhile, this paper takes demand updating and integrator's altruistic behavior into account, establishes a Stackelberg game model and draws the following key conclusions. First, this paper determines the conditions of cooperation, when provider's profit distribution ratio is in the middle, the integrator and the provider cooperate successfully and adopt the merger strategy. Second, this paper finds that demand updating affects the scope of cooperation. When demand decreases (increases), the scope of cooperation between suppliers and integrator decreases (increases). Finally, when the demand reduction degree is small, the demand updating benefits the integrator's profit. In this situation, integrator has incentive to share updated demand information to provider.

Prosocial aggression tracks genetic relatedness distinctly from emotional closeness.

Altruistic behavior is understood to largely stem from adaptations for kin altruism, contingent on degree of relatedness, and/or reciprocal altruism, contingent on degree of benefits conferred in exchange for help. Because kin qualify for both kin and reciprocal altruism, they should receive greater support than friends, as has been demonstrated in prior research. Here, we tested this prediction with regard to willingness to punish on another's behalf, comparing inclinations to aggress against transgressors when the victim was framed as an acquaintance, close friend, cousin, sibling, or oneself. Participants endorsed comparably greater direct aggression on behalf of the self, kin, or friends relative to acquaintances, despite reporting substantially greater emotional closeness to friends, consistent with what has been termed a kinship premium. Kin engendered greater aid than is explicable by affiliative emotion. Participants also reported less anger-yet trends toward greater disgust-when victims were acquaintances relative to all other conditions, replicating prior work distinguishing the social functions of anger and disgust. These results are discussed as they inform both the kinship premium hypothesis and sociofunctional accounts of moral emotion. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Ignorance by choice: A meta-analytic review of the underlying motives of willful ignorance and its consequences.

People sometimes avoid information about the impact of their actions as an excuse to be selfish. Such "willful ignorance" reduces altruistic behavior and has detrimental effects in many consumer and organizational contexts. We report the first meta-analysis on willful ignorance, testing the robustness of its impact on altruistic behavior and examining its underlying motives. We analyze 33,603 decisions made by 6,531 participants in 56 different treatment effects, all employing variations of an experimental paradigm assessing willful ignorance. Meta-analytic results reveal that 40% of participants avoid easily obtainable information about the consequences of their actions on others, leading to a 15.6-percentage point decrease in altruistic behavior compared to when information is provided. We discuss the motives behind willful ignorance and provide evidence consistent with excuse-seeking behaviors to maintain a positive self-image. We investigate the moderators of willful ignorance and address the theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of our findings on who engages in willful ignorance, as well as when and why. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

The Relationship Between Religiosity and Altruistic Behavior on Covid-19 Volunteers of Muhammadiyah Sidoarjo

This Reaserch is motivated by the phenomenom of Covid-19 volunteers who expeinece altruistic behavior problems. This reaserch doing to know the positive relationship between religiosity and altruistic behavior in Covid-19 Muhammadiyah Sidoarjo volunteers. The hypothesis proposed by the researcher is that there is a positive relationship between religiosity and altruistic behavior in Covid-19 Muhammadiyah Sidoarjo volunteers. the quantitative method was chosen by researcher to achieve the objectives of this study. Responden in this study were taken based on Isaac and Michael’s scale table with 5% of the population 226 taken into 139 research subjects. This study used an altruistic behavior scale and religiosity scale. The results of the product moment analysis showed that the rxy correlation coefficient was 0,268 with a significance of 0,001 (P< 0,05) meaning that there was a significance positive relationship between altruistic behavior and religiosity in Covid-19 volunteers of Muhammadiyah Sidoarjo. The effective Contribution of religiosity was 6,5 % towards altruistic behavior. that there are 93,5 % of other factor that influence outside the religiosity variable.

Self-serving reward and punishment: evidence from the laboratory

Reward for altruism and punishment for selfishness are crucial components for the maintenance of society. Past studies have provided strong evidence that people are willing to incur costs to punish selfish behaviors and to reward altruistic behaviors, but how their willingness to do so depends on their relationship with the individuals conducting the anti-social or pro-social behaviors is much less explored. To probe into this question, we devised a three-stage experiment that combined a revised dictator game and third-party reward or punishment. We employed two payoff frameworks, alignment and conflict, and analyzed how third-party’s willingness to reward and punish differed when their interests were either aligned or in conflict with the first-party under observation. We found that due to considerations for personal interests, third-party’s reward and punishment levels deviated from what was deemed “legitimate” by society, that is, the level of reward and punishment that enhances society’s intrinsic motivations to comply with social norms and act pro-socially. When an anti-social behavior was observed, third-party punished less severely under the alignment framework than under the conflict framework; when a pro-social behavior was observed, third-party demonstrated self-serving reward under the alignment framework, but they rewarded altruistically under the conflict framework. These findings provided evidence for third-party’s self-serving reward and punishment.

Reflective thinking, allyship and mental well-being: a correlational study

ABSTRACT Detrimental social behaviour radiates from vicious societies. Injustice, insecurity, and discrimination are hitches in social well-being; it generates psychosocial challenges to society. Endorsing congruent social behaviour initiates social well-being and establishes a secure and peaceful society. Allyship practice is wayfaring towards social well-being, but it takes a toll on the mental well-being of allies. Mental well-being contributes to individuals’ productivity, creativity, and overall social relationship. The present study aims to understand the relationship between reflective thinking, allyship, and mental well-being. The sample consists of 496 undergraduate students. The study further suggests that reflective thinking can envisage allyship and mental well-being. Reflection is a scientific inquiry and disciplined way of thinking; it helps to develop appropriate attitudes and beliefs toward other social groups. The study highlighted the significance of reflection in altruistic behaviour like allyship and in mental well-being. It also underlines the necessity to focus more on the well-being of allies.

Excessive Altruism and Its Underlying Motivation: Effects on Likability in Japan and the US

The present study examined whether there is a difference in the liking for the actor depending on whether the motivation for excessive altruistic behavior is selfish or altruistic. Two experiments were conducted via a Web-based survey. Participants in the experiments responded with their liking toward an altruistic actor, assuming a situation in which the actor responded about his/her motivations. The results showed no effect of individual differences in caution (Study 1), but did show differences between Japan and the US (Study 2). In Japan, actions with altruistic motivations may be evaluated more favorably because selfish motivations were judged to be normatively unfavorable, whereas in the US, where people are tolerant of deviation from the norm, excessively altruistic behavior with selfish motivation may be evaluated as favorably as that with altruistic motivation.

The impact of people with mobility limitations on exit choice

Demographic trends and advances in accessibility have led to more heterogeneous populations in public buildings. While providing accessible evacuation, it may be necessary to direct evacuees to different evacuation paths depending on functional capacity. The presence of people with mobility limitations (e.g., wheelchair users) may affect the evacuation of others, possibly influencing the decision making of neighbouring evacuees. This study investigates how exit choice of people is influenced by the functional capacity of other evacuees and the design of the exit. Virtual Reality was used to design a discrete choice experiment in which participants were exposed to multiple choice situations and a mixed logit model was fitted to the data. Results from 40 participants indicate that exit choice was positively influenced by other people choosing the exit, and a larger effect was found when the other person was a wheelchair user. The design of the exit also influenced the exit choice of the participants. Large inter-person differences existed. Strategies reported by the participants in the subsequent questionnaire included altruistic behaviour. These results can inform fire safety engineers when outlining evacuation strategies and evacuation model users in their assumptions concerning exit choice in building evacuation.

Effects of health, family, and altruism on retirement savings

Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, this paper broadens the analysis of retire- ment savings by examining the effects of health, children, altruism, and family of origin attributes on the decision of whether to save for retirement and on how much retirement savings are accumu- lated. The presence of children in the household generally reduces the probability of saving for retirement. Poor personal or parental health diminishes retirement savings outcomes. Altruistic behavior generally presents as complementary to retirement savings, and the evidence suggests chil- dren of mothers who saved for retirement are more likely to do the same.