1. Altruism
8 June 2004

2. Evolutionary Perspective
Inclusive Fitness/Kin Selection
Carnegie Foundation
Burnstein, Crandall, & Kitayama (1994)
Does our implicit understanding of helping match the evolutionary psychology model of altruism?

3. Helping and Altruism Burnstein, Crandall, & Kitayama, 1994
Everyday situations
Life or death situations
Helping others is a direct function of recipients’ ability to enhance the inclusive fitness of the helpers
Study: Imagine individuals asleep in different rooms of a rapidly burning building
You only have time to rescue one of them
Ss circle the target they’re most likely to help
Ss cross out the target they’re least likely to help 1 2 3 4
0.5
0.25
0.125
Kinship
Tendency to help

4. More Burnstein et al., 1994: Tendency to help by Age of Target
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
3.0
> 1 yr.
10 yrs.
18 yrs.
45 yrs.
75 yrs.
Age of Target
Everyday situations
Life or death situations

5. Even More Burnstein et al
Even More Burnstein et al., 1994: Tendency to help under famine conditions.
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
> 1 yr.
10 yrs.
18 yrs.
45 yrs.
75 yrs.
Age of Target

6. More Evolution Reciprocal Altruism
Evolutionarily stable strategies, or why “pure” altruism can’t exist
Helping in big cities vs. small towns

7. Social Exchange Theory
Cost-benefit or economic theory of helping:
help only if it will get you more than you give
Allen NY subway experiment
3 Conditions
DV: % subjects correcting Scary Muscle Guy
Control
Insult
Threat 50 25

8. Empathy Altruism Theory
Batson
“Pure altruism” exists
Occurs when people help because they empathize with the sufferer
If no empathy, then helping = social exchange (not altruistic)

9. Negative State Relief Model
No such thing as pure altruism
We help others to make ourselves feel better
If we can make ourselves feel better in a way that’s easier than helping, we won’t help
Evidence?

10. Negative State Relief, cont’d
Kids must learn that helping makes them feel good
Perry (1986)
Cialdini & Kenrick (1976)

11. More Negative State Relief Schaller & Cialdini, 1989
One IV
Post-tape expectation: news vs comedy vs “easy help”
One DV
How many hours are subjects willing to donate to Katie?
Results?
hours
News
Comedy
Easy
Help

12. Even More Negative State Relief: Effects of Guilt
McMillen & Austin (1971)
IV1: confed either gives away answers or not
DV: % lying
IV2: expter asks for help or not
DV: minutes helping
Regan (1972)
Field experiment
IV: guilt vs. control
DV: % helping

13. Negative States Don’t Always Lead to Helping
Thompson et al. (1980)
IV: Self- vs. other-focused grief
DV: % giving anonymous help 20 40 60 80
100
self-focused
other-focused

14. What about Positive States?
Ibsen et al. (1976) Field study
IV: free stationary vs. control
DV: % willing to help
Why do happy people help?
Prolongs good mood
Good mood 
Positive thoughts 
Positive behaviors 
Etc.

15. What Kinds of Situations Increase or Decrease Helping?
Location location location….
Granet field experiment:
Helping in subway vs. in airport
2 theories tested:
SES?
Familiarity?

16. Having the Time to Help
hurry
control
Darley & Batson (1973): Seminary students in a hurry…
IV’s: hurry vs. control group; speech topic
DV: helping 70 60 50 40 30 20 10
jobs
good samaritan
parable

17. Where We Live Levine Results: Helping in 36 cities of different sizes
Geography
Population vs. population density
SES

18. Who do we help? Gender Similarity Bias
Eagly & Crowley (1986) meta-analysis
Short term help by males vs. by females
Why?
Similarity Bias
Emswiller (1971) field experiment

19. How to Increase Helping?
Teach moral inclusion
Model altruism
Sarason et al., 1991
Hearold, 1986
Attribute helpful behavior to altruistic motives (Batson, 1978; 1979)