Chapter 8 Pro-social Behaviour.docx
- 1. CHPATER 8 PRO SOCIAL BEHAVIOR Introduction Prosocial behavior is voluntary behavior intended to benefit another. This includes behaviors such as helping, sharing, providing comfort to another, feeling empathy for other people, and thinking about the welfare of other people. For example, if my classmate needs my help in her studies and I wholeheartedly help her out so that she can score a better grade in her exams. Then, this is prosocial behavior. The term itself originated during the 1970s and was introduced by social scientists as an antonym for the term antisocial behavior. While people engage in antisocial behavior with the intent to cause distress to someone, people engage in prosocial behavior to help. However, understanding prosocial behavior involves digging deeper than this, such as understanding the role of empathy and moral reasoning. Prosocial behavior is defined as behaviors that support others. These behaviors are connected with high moral standards and benefit society. Prosocial behaviors are voluntary in nature and apply to the betterment of others Reasons Behind Prosocial Behavior Prosocial behavior may range from small favors to great deeds. It may take merely a moment, or it may be a long-term endeavor. It may be done without much conscious thought or weighing up the pros and cons. It may be under the control of situational forces or may express the personality of the donor (heredity). Prosocial behaviors can be performed for a variety of reasons, ranging from selfish and manipulative reasons (e.g., helping someone to get something in return) to moral and other-oriented reasons (e.g., helping because of moral principles). The
- 2. findings of studies on prosocial behavior seem to be ambiguous: on the one hand, people are committed to helping victims of disasters; on the other, there are many examples of people not helping a victim in urgent need. Prosocial behavior can be distinguished into three subtypes; proactive, reactive, and altruistic. Proactive: These are prosocial actions that serve self-benefitting purposes. Examples: 1- You help someone so you can feel good about your action. 2- Giving a large tip to a waiter to impress your boss with your generosity. Reactive: These are actions that are performed in response to individual needs. Examples: 1- If a friend needs some money to buy a book, giving them money is an example of reactive prosocial behavior 2- Sharing your lunch with a person who forgot to bring his lunch. Altruistic: These include actions that are meant to help others without any expectations of personal gain. When you help someone, it is purely out of the goodness of your heart. Or we can say this is an action devoid of any reward. Examples: 1- Include volunteer work 2- Donating money,
- 3. 3- Or helping a neighbor move a heavy item of furniture. The most striking type of prosocial behavior is altruism, where a person takes on a cost to help another person with no expectation or possibility of receiving a benefit in return. Altruistic behaviors are different than proactive and reactive behaviors in that the former is motivated by nothing more than the selfless desire to help others. Proactive and reactive behaviors are considered reciprocal. In a model of reciprocity, there is an understanding or assumption that the actions of doing good for others will motivate them to return the favor or behaviors. Researchers also suggest that these different types of prosocial behaviors are often likely to be motivated by differing forces. For example, proactive prosocial actions were found to often be motivated by status-linked goals and popularity within a group. Altruistic prosocial behaviors, on the other hand, were more closely linked to being liked by peers and achieving shared goals. Motives of Prosocial Behavior What are the motives of people to help others? There are many hypotheses related to this concept as to why do we help others. 1.Empathy-Altruism hypothesis "It feels good to help others”. Empathy means the capacity to be able to experience other's emotional states, feel sympathetic toward them and take their perspective. It is stated in the hypotheses that; "Prosocial behavior is motivated solely for the purpose of increasing the welfare of recipient."
- 4. 2.Negative State Relief hypothesis "We relief from our negative states when we help others." Individuals experiencing negative emotions are motivated to help in order to achieve relief from such emotions. For example You get a very low CGPA this semester, you are feeling bad, and you are in a negative state of mind, and then you saw a person who got F grade this semester, now you try to place yourself in his or her situation and you went to them and support them emotionally and try to help them out in passing their course. So, whenever you help someone, you are removing your own negative state so you can feel good. In other words, we do good things in order to stop feeling bad. 3.Empathetic Joy hypothesis "It feels good to have positive impact on others." Helping in response to Empathy is motivated neither by a selfless concern for the welfare of others, nor by the reduction of personal distress but rather by the joy one experiences when observing that another person's needs have been met. For example: When we share our half plate food to the hungry man, they say "thank You”, they smile to us. We feel joy, we feel happy that their need is been met. Example: A lot of people spend a lot of money on their kids by buying them new clothes, toys. They feel smile, joy and happiness of their kids.
- 5. 4.Competitive Altruism "Sometimes people do help because they wanted to increase or raise their own reputation." This view suggests that one important reason that people help others is that doing so boosts their own status and reputation and this way, ultimately brings them large benefits. For example You find a lot of donors who support the organizations and give them a lot of donations, whenever they arrive that organization, they got a lot of reputation and respect because their status has been increase. According to the competitive altruism theory, people sometimes engage in prosocial behavior because doing so provides them with large gains in status. Factors affecting Prosocial Behaviour Research indicates that many factors contribute to whether or not a person decides to help a stranger in need. Some of these factors may be situational, like they didn't notice the incident because they were in a hurry or they believe the victim is responsible for their current state. Other factors include the mood a person is in and their personality traits. A lot of these factors coincide with each other and therefore more than one may be present while deciding whether an individual helps another. Internal Factors Internal factors are characteristics within a person that influence their behaviour. In prosocial behaviour when referring to internal factors, we are looking into personality traits that
- 6. either enhance or inhibit helping. While looking into why or why not people help based on inner attributes, altruism and ego centrism often come up. People either help for the benefit of themselves, egocentrism or solely for the benefit of others, known as altruism. External Factors External factors are based off of situations therefore behaviour depends on the environment around the individual. In terms of helping behaviours, the situation one is in could definitely influence whether they engage in helpful behaviours or not. Prosocial Behaviour is also affected by factors relating to the person, including: Physical factors Age, health, illness, pain, influence of a substance or medication personal and emotional factors personality, beliefs, expectations, emotions, mental health. Situational Factor Even though some people are more prone to help than are others, situational factors also can have a powerful effect on people’s willingness to help. For example, people are less likely to help when the cost of helping is high. They also are more likely to help attractive people and to help if they are the only ones available to help (e.g., there are no other people around who see an individual who needs assistance). People in good moods are likely to assist others more than are people in neutral moods, although sometimes people in bad moods seem to help others to raise their moods. People also are more likely to help if they are exposed to models of prosocial behaviour.
- 7. Moreover, the interaction of situational factors with personality characteristics of potential helpers is important; for example, sociable people seem more likely to provide types of helping that involve social interaction whereas shy individuals often may tend to help in situations in which they do not need to be outgoing or socially assertive. Why do people fail to help in an emergency? It is normal for people to freeze or be shocked when they see an emergency situation or someone under attack. This is usually a reaction to fear. They are too weak to help, they misunderstand the situation and see threat when there in none, and they fear that intervening will put their lives in danger. The bystander effect: The term bystander effect is a social psychological theory that refers to the tendency of people to become less active in high-risk situations due to the presence of other bystanders. For Example: Someone murdered a man, while several of his neighbors looked on and no one intervened until it was too late. Diffusion of responsibility: Diffusion of responsibility occurs when a duty or task is shared between a group of people instead of only one person. Whenever there is an emergency situation in which more than one person is present, there is a diffusion of responsibility. Three steps that categorize this phenomenon: 1- The moral obligation to help affects not just one person, but an entire group in the face of an emergency. 2- Instead of resting alone, we can share responsibility for not helping. 3- The belief that another bystander in the group will offer help.