Gratitude and prosocial behavior: helping when it costs you

The ability of the emotion gratitude to shape costly prosocial behavior was examined in three studies employing interpersonal emotion inductions and requests for assistance. Study 1 demonstrated that gratitude increases efforts to assist a benefactor even when such efforts are costly (i.e., hedonically negative), and that this increase differs from the effects of a general positive affective state. Additionally, mediational analyses revealed that gratitude, as opposed to simple awareness of reciprocity norms, drove helping behavior. Furthering the theory that gratitude mediates prosocial behavior, Study 2 replicated the findings of Study 1 and demonstrated gratitude's ability to function as an incidental emotion by showing it can increase assistance provided to strangers. Study 3 revealed that this incidental effect dissipates if one is made aware of the true cause of the emotional state. Implications of these findings for the role of gratitude in building relationships are discussed.     

Justice and organizational citizenship behavior intentions: fair rewards versus fair treatment

In a sample of 114 employees from various industries, organizations, and positions, the likelihood of organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) increased when employee perceptions of fair treatment by supervisors became more positive. Perceptions of fair rewards and fair formal procedures were not predictors of OCB intentions. After the authors controlled for established patterns of OCB and demographic characteristics, interactional justice perceptions were significantly related to the intention of performing specific organizationally beneficial activities.     

Mimicry and helping behavior: an evaluation of mimicry on explicit helping request

Research found that mimicry behavior led to increased helping behavior toward the mimicker and is associated with higher positive evaluation of the mimicker. Furthermore, studies on helping behavior focused only on implicit helping behavior, whereas no experimental study on explicit helping request was tested. An experiment was carried out in which a female student-confederate mimicked or not mimicked a participant during a discussion about paintings and, after that, solicited the participant for a written feedback about an essay. It was found that mimicry increased compliance to the confederate's request.     

Sequential development of helping behavior: A cognitive-learning approach

It is suggested that cognitive, social-perspective, and moral skills, on the one hand, and a self-regulatory skill on the other, determine the extent, quantity, and quality of helping acts. A framework for the analysis of helping behavior development by integrating cognitive-development- and social-learning approaches is suggested. The framework proposes that altruistic behavior is a specific, highest-level kind of helping behavior. Helping behavior develops sequentially as its quality changes. The quality of the helping behavior is reflected in individuals' motivation to act. Empirical evidence supporting the suggested framework is presented, and the contribution of this framework for the study of prosocial behavior is discussed.     

An investigation of planned helping behavior

It is argued that stable, individual differences in helping behavior have not generally been observed in previous research because of the type of helping studied. This paper advocates the study of planned helping behavior as opposed to spontaneous helping behavior. The results of three studies are reported. In Study 1, an instrument designed to measure level of involvement in planned helping activities was developed. Scores on this instrument were found to be stable over a 7-month period. Further analysis revealed two major types of planned helping: (a) formal, organizational helping and (b) informal helping between friends and family. Study 2 examined a variety of intrapsychic and demographic correlates of formal and informal planned helping. Study 3 found support for the hypothesis that people in helping professions have higher levels of involvement in everyday planned helping than do people in nonhelping occupations. It is concluded that the study of planned helping, although posing methodological difficulties, is a necessary adjunct to experimental research.     

Interventions stimulating prosocial helping behavior: A systematic review

This systematic review of the literature aims to identify, analyze, and synthesize studies assessing the effectiveness of interventions stimulating prosocial behavior. It concentrates on helping behavior and covers experimental and quasi-experimental research concerning interventions carried out in different settings. This review was performed in accordance with the PRISMA guidelines. Of the initial sample of 4,653 publications found in databases, 49 articles met our inclusion criteria and were classified as eligible for data extraction and narrative synthesis. The studies included in the review assessed 63 interventions, most of them targeted at children and adolescents. We distinguished three strategies stimulating prosocial behavior: behavioral, cognitive, and emotional. This review is informative for both researchers and practitioners. It provides researchers with methodological guidelines concerning how to conduct studies on the effectiveness of prosocial interventions, and it provides practitioners with guidelines on empirically tested strategies for stimulating prosocial helping behavior.     

Another evaluation of touch and helping behavior

Although positive effect of touch on compliance has been widely reported, new evaluation was made with an unusual request. 80 male bus drivers were solicited by a male or a female confederate to take the bus despite having too little money for the fare. Bus drivers were briefly touched by the confederate during solicitation. Analysis showed that bus drivers who were touched accepted the request more favorably but only when made by a female.     

Determinants of information-seeking behavior

Two studies examined situational determinants of choice among anagram tests that varied both in difficulty and in diagnosticity (the information they provided about one's own ability). In both studies, subjects worked on a preliminary anagram test before making their choices. Study 1 manipulated level of performance on the preliminary test. Results showed that high performance led to preferring more difficult and more diagnostic tests. In Study 2, subjects were either paid or not paid for their performance on the preliminary test. Results showed that pay led to a preference for more diagnostic tests. Unexpectedly, results of both studies showed that although difficulty and diagnosticity were defined independently of one another, they were not perceived as such. Thus, high diagnostic tests were perceived as more difficult; more difficult tests were perceived as more diagnostic; and the difference between high and low diagnostic tests in perceived diagnosticity and choice of items (high diagnostic tests had higher scores on both measures) were more pronounced among more difficult tests. Motivational as well as cognitive interpretations of the results were discussed.     

Values and helping behavior: A study in four cultures

Values are important factors in determining individuals' behaviours. Previous studies have examined the relations between values and helping behaviour, but usually in the context of a single culture. The current study examines the relations between personal value types and helping behaviour among university students (N = 722) in four cultures (Germany, Scotland‐UK, Israel and Turkey). Across cultures, the value types of self‐transcendence versus self‐enhancement and conservation versus openness to change were positively related to helping. Specifically, self‐transcendence values were positively related, and self‐enhancement and openness to change values negatively related, to helping behaviour. The correlations pattern did not differ significantly between cultures.     

Positive mood and helping behavior: a test of six hypotheses

Past research has shown rather consistently that positive mood states lead to increased helpfulness. In an expanded analysis of the published literature, we examined six distinct views about this relation: the focus of attention, objective self-awareness, separate process, social outlook, mood maintenance, and concomitance hypotheses. For each of 61 positive affect conditions in which it was possible to generate an effect-size estimate corresponding to the relative degree of helpfulness exhibited by positive mood subjects (compared with neutral affect subjects), judges assessed the contextual levels of variables relevant to each of the six hypotheses by reading the Method section of each article. Higher-order partial correlation coefficients were then calculated to isolate the independent contribution of each of the theoretically relevant variables to the variation among the 61 effect sizes. The results support the focus of attention, separate process, social outlook, and mood maintenance hypotheses, and partially support the objective self-awareness and concomitance hypotheses.     

High cost helping scenario: The role of empathy,prosocial reasoning and moral disengagement on helping behavior

This study aimed to investigate the process that leads people to offer or omit help in response to an explicit request for assistance, taking into account both emotional and cognitive factors. Specifically, a hypothetical scenario methodology was used in a sample of 174 Italian youths (50% males) to examine whether and how factors such as empathy, prosocial moral reasoning and moral disengagement influence the propensity to help when providing assistance is not in the individual’s personal interest. While a few previous studies have included moral disengagement as an antecedent of prosocial decision making, we highlight the significance of this factor in the avoidance of moral responsibility towards others in need. The results highlight two ways in which differences in emotional tendencies and moral-cognitive processes may operate in prosocial decision making in high personal cost situations. First, high empathy levels could promote an altruistic response which in turn fosters mature prosocial moral reasoning. Second, personal distress may enhance moral disengagement mechanisms that may facilitate self-centred behaviors.     

Changing commuters’ behavior using rewards: A study of rush-hour avoidance

In a 13-week field study conducted in The Netherlands, participants were provided with daily rewards – monetary and in-kind, in order to encourage them to avoid driving during the morning rush-hour. Participants could earn a reward (money or credits to keep a Smartphone handset), by driving to work earlier or later, by switching to another mode or by teleworking. The collected data, complemented with pre and post measurement surveys, were analyzed using longitudinal techniques and mixed logistic regression. The results assert that the reward is the main extrinsic motivation for discouraging rush-hour driving. The monetary reward exhibits diminishing sensitivity, whereas the Smartphone has endowment qualities. Although the reward influences the motivation to avoid the rush-hour, the choice how to change behavior is influenced by additional factors including education, scheduling, habitual behavior, attitudes, and travel information availability.     

Semantically induced memories of love and helping behavior

This study tested the effect of semantically induced thoughts of love on helping behavior. In a natural setting, 253 participants were interviewed and asked to retrieve the memory of a love episode or, in the control condition, a piece of music they loved. They then met another confederate who asked for money. Analysis showed that inducing the idea of love had a significant positive effect on compliance to a request by a male passerby who was asked for help by a female confederate, but not by a female passerby. Theoretical explanations are presented, based on a gender-role expectation hypothesis.     

Coping with spousal loss: potential buffering effects of self-reported helping behavior

The present study examined the role of self-reported helping behavior in attenuating the helper's depression following spousal loss. Using archival data from the Changing Lives of Older Couples sample (N = 289), the study shows that among bereaved participants who had experienced high loss-related grief, helping behavior (providing instrumental support to others) was associated with an accelerated decline in depressive symptoms for the helper from 6 months to 18 months following spousal loss. This relationship between giving help and recovery from depression was independent of support received, as well as measured health, and interpersonal and demographic factors. Implications of these results for theoretical approaches to the study of close relationships and well-being are discussed.