prosocial behaviors
Assessments of prosocial behaviors have typically included global measures which measure how often a person may engage in a prosocial behavior across situations and personal motivations. Some scholars, however, have noted the usefulness of defining subtypes of prosocial behaviors. Prosocial behaviors that are defined as a product of the situation or personal motives, for example, may have unique correlates that are otherwise masked when implementing global measures. Some researchers have identified six such types of prosocial behaviors: altruism (selfless helping, usually intrinsically motivated by the primary desire to help others), public (helping in front of an audience, usually motivated by wanting to gain approval, respect from others, and self-worth), compliant (helping because it has been requested by another), emotional (helping under emotionally evocative circumstances), dire (helping in emergency situations), and anonymous (helping without the receiver's knowing the identity of the helper). Other unique types of prosocial behaviors studied by researchers have included affective/supportive (nurturance and caring), helpfulness (helping with household chores), volunteerism, service learning, and cooperative behaviors in children.
Some scholars have argued that some types of prosocial behaviors (e.g., altruism) are truly motivated by selfless motives such as empathy, sympathy, and internalized norms, values, and principles. Some scholars have debated that prosocial behaviors are primarily driven by egoistic motives such as money, social approval, and social power. Furthermore, it is likely these two motives may sometimes conflict in particular situations and might produce moral dilemmas. There is considerable research on altruism and prosocial behaviors, much of which focuses on situational factors such as characteristics of the victim, number of bystanders, mood, and ambiguousness of the need. This continues to be a hotly debated topic of research.
There appears to be a genetic and biological basis for prosocial tendencies in humans. For example, on the basis of twin studies, empathy appears to have a strong heritable component. Furthermore, empathy appears early in life, and individual differences in empathy remain stable over the life span. Although evidence on the heritability of prosocial behaviors is sparse, there is evidence that such behaviors appear early in life and remain stable over the life span. Moreover, a recent surge of studies have focused on the links among temperament, empathy, and prosocial behaviors, and these studies further support the notion of a biological basis for these prosocial tendencies. Negative affectivity (an aspect of temperament) in infancy, for example, has been linked to early childhood prosocial development. Other studies have shown that interactions among emotion regulation and moderate levels of affectivity are also related to more frequent prosocial behaviors. The accumulating evidence on the genetic and biological basis of prosocial tendencies also supports evolutionary theorists' assertions that prosocial tendencies are adaptive for human functioning.
Animal research has also supported evolutionary mechanisms for prosocial behavior. Three hypotheses have been proposed to explain the adaptiveness of prosocial behaviors: genetic similarly, kin selection, and reciprocal altruism. These hypotheses suggest that individuals engage in prosocial behaviors to increase reproductive success and fitness. Research with great apes and chimpanzees has accordingly demonstrated that these mammals exhibit a range of prosocial behaviors, including cooperation, nurturance, and altruistic-like behaviors. A neurophysiological mechanism that has also been supported by animal research includes the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and frontal cortical functioning, which are associated with arousability and self-regulation. Early maternal care experiences do seem to impact later sensitivity to distress in research with rodents. Researchers have also speculated on the importance of central neuropeptides such as oxytocin and vasopressin in affiliative behaviors during mother-infant bonding and other positive social behaviors.
While young children are capable of expressing emotions associated with prosocial behaviors (e.g., concern for others, sorrow, sadness), the frequency of prosocial behaviors does change with age. In general, the frequency of prosocial behaviors increases into adolescence, with the greatest age increase found between preschool and adolescence. Smaller age increases have been found between infancy and preschool, childhood and adolescence, and throughout adolescence. However, recently, there is evidence that prosocial behaviors might decline slightly during adolescence. These age-related changes may be attributable to changes in sociocognitive and socioemotional skills, or they may be due to changes in the social context. For example, there is evidence that prosocial behaviors may increase as a result of increases in the social opportunities to engage in prosocial actions. These age increases, though, may be qualified by study characteristics such as study design (e.g., observational vs. paper-and-pencil measures) or the type of prosocial behavior being examined.
Regarding gender differences, researchers have typically found that girls engage in more prosocial behaviors than boys. These findings support gender socialization theorists, who maintain that girls, more than boys, are encouraged to exhibit nurturing and caring behaviors. These gender-specific experiences and their impact on prosocial behaviors also accumulate and intensify over time; accordingly, gender differences in prosocial behaviors have been found to be the greatest into adolescence. However, several reviews of gender differences in prosocial behavior have found that these differences may not be as evident once study characteristics are taken into account. For example, while women tend to engage in more nurturant types of prosocial behavior, men tend to engage in more instrumental (risky/chivalrous) forms of prosocial behavior. Thus, the type of prosocial behavior being examined is one factor that may affect the extent of gender differences reported.
Parents have been identified as key socializing agents of prosocial development during childhood. Parents can be models of desirable behavior, reinforce prosocial behaviors, encourage children in moral decision-making situations, or provide direct verbal messages such as beliefs or attitudes about prosocial behaviors. Researchers have found that prosocial development has been positively, but not consistently, related to authoritative (vs. authoritarian) parenting and parental support and attachment. Disciplining techniques such as the use of inductions and explanations have also been positively related to prosocial behaviors. For example, these parents often induce empathy and perspective taking by explaining how a child's actions may harm (or benefit) others. Moreover, explanations provide an opportunity to transmit parental moral values in an emotionally regulated manner. This emotionally regulated manner may be perceived by the child as appropriate, leading the child to accept a parental message more willingly. Conversely, children may be less likely to accept the same moral message if power assertion accompanies it, as situations involving power assertion are usually emotionally overarousing. Power assertion also may lead to fewer prosocial behaviors as parents who use this technique provide models of aggressive behaviors.
Siblings are another powerful socializing agent during childhood for the development of prosocial behaviors. For example, younger children not only learn about prosocial behaviors that older siblings may model, but they also learn about the consequences for engaging, or failing to engage, in prosocial behaviors. These older siblings may also offer opportunities for younger siblings to practice prosocial behaviors. This influence, however, may be dependent on younger siblings' socialcognitive abilities, emotional responsiveness, and emotion regulation skills. Researchers have also suggested that play contexts may be important training grounds for the expression of prosocial behaviors, as many of the prosocial behaviors observed among siblings have been during play.
Peers become increasingly important socializing agents of prosocial development into adolescence. Interacting with peers provides opportunities to engage in prosocial behaviors with socialization agents who are similar in social power and status, and to observe and practice new modes of providing instrumental help. Through social comparisons, children gain a deeper understanding of their moral self by exposure to differing perspectives on moral issues. In addition to family members, peers may offer sources of support and warmth which may facilitate prosocial development. Peers also provide reinforcements or punishers that can foster or diminish prosocial behaviors in children. Finally, engaging in prosocial behaviors may lead to better peer relationships as children who exhibit high levels of prosocial behaviors tend to have higher ratings of peer acceptance and status.
The media have also been studied as another socializing agent of prosocial behaviors. A number of studies in the 1970s demonstrated the strong influence of positive television and film models on prosocial behaviors. Overall, researchers have found that those observers who watched characters who engaged in prosocial acts (especially if they were physically, socially, or psychologically similar to the viewer) engaged in prosocial behaviors themselves in the future. Later studies revealed that the effect of prosocial television on behaviors is much stronger than the effect of antisocial television on future behaviors. Few studies examining media's effect on prosocial behaviors have been conducted since then, with fewer studies examining the effects of media popular with adolescents (e.g., magazines and novels) or types of interactive media (e.g., Internet, video games).
Individual differences in sociocognitive skills also have been studied in regard to prosocial behavior. Two of the most commonly studied sociocognitive skills are perspective taking and moral reasoning. Perspective taking, or understanding another's situation, has been theoretically linked to prosocial behaviors in that it has been thought that being able to understand another's plight may result in sympathy, which in turn may lead to engaging in helpful actions in order to relieve this person's distress. Alternatively, being able to understand another's situation may result in disequilibrium, and this disequilibrium may then cause behaviors that will reduce this state. Research on perspective taking and prosocial behaviors has generally been mixed. However, scholars have found the strongest relations between these two constructs when there is a match between the task characteristics, or when perspective taking is jointly studied with other influences on prosocial behaviors (e.g., sympathy, other related cognitive skills).
Moral reasoning, specifically, prosocial moral reasoning, is another common sociocognitive correlate of prosocial behaviors. Prosocial moral reasoning is defined as thinking about dilemmas in which one's needs are in conflict with the needs of others in the relative absence of formal laws or rules. This care-oriented moral reasoning is in contrast to moral reasoning that is justice oriented (e.g., Kohlberg), which has not been thought to be as strongly associated with prosocial behaviors. Prosocial moral reasoning has been theorized to increase in sophistication along with other age-related cognitive advances (e.g., abstract thinking, perspective taking). This higher-level reasoning, which is more other oriented and internalized, has been found by researchers to be related to higher levels of prosocial behaviors.
Despite the evidence for the biological basis of prosocial behaviors, there is abundant evidence that cross-cultural differences of prosocial behaviors exist. Moral socialization theorists have asserted that culture group differences in prosocial behaviors can arise from unique socialization experiences and unique culturally related ecological features. Some scholars have noted that those in collectivist societies (i.e., orientation and emphasis on group goals and needs) more frequently express cooperative behaviors than those in individualistic societies (i.e., orientation and emphasis on self-goals and needs). Furthermore, culture group differences in prosocial behaviors have been shown such that children in societies that are commonly assigned to primary caregiver roles and responsibilities engage in higher levels of prosocial behaviors than children in other societies. These culture group differences in prosocial behaviors also appear to be a function of the characteristics of peers children commonly interact with and the degree to which they interact with and around adult figures. It is also likely that culture group differences in prosocial behaviors vary according to parenting practices and values unique to each society; however, much more research on culture group differences in prosocial behaviors is needed. – GC, MM
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