Self-focused autonomy, other-focused pro-sociality, and well-being: a cross-national cluster analysis.

Through cluster analysis, this study seeks to identify various clusters that differ in the level of self-focused and other-focused caring (e.g., autonomy and pro-sociality) and to contrast the happiness and life satisfaction among them. This approach is based on the notion that unifying autonomy and pro-sociality is more advantageous than separating them for well-being, which follows the theories and empirical studies. The World Value Survey dataset (N = 76897; Mage = 43.02, SD = 16.37) is used, which uses random probability representative adult samples from 51 countries or territories. Results suggest that autonomy and pro-sociality both have distinct implications for happiness and life satisfaction. Four distinct clusters are identified: autonomous (high self-focused and low other-focused), prosocial (low self-focused and high other-focused), flourished (high self-focused and high other-focused), and indifferent (low self-focused and low other-focused). In terms of indicators of well-being, the flourished group has the highest levels of happiness and life satisfaction, followed by the autonomous group, the prosocial group, and the indifferent group. It appears that individuals who exhibit both high self-focused and high other-focused caring attain the greatest well-being. The implications, limitations, and potential directions for future research are discussed.

Aggressive and Defensive Behaviour, Normative, and Social Adjustment in the Complex Dynamics of School Bullying.

Bullying is a group phenomenon in which schoolchildren take on different roles. Although certain contextual elements play a key role in its evolution, very few longitudinal studies have been carried out to date which investigate how these factors interact. This study aims to explore the different class groupings as regards bullying norms and to examine the effect of the type of norm, social, and normative adjustment and pro-sociality, also of the interaction of group norms with involvement in aggression and victim defence in bullying situations. A total of 3,358 secondary school students (50.71% girls, Mage = 13 years, SD = 1.34) participated in the study. Four groups of norms towards bullying were identified: anti-bullying, anti-bullying but not actively defending, indifference, and pro-bullying. Univariate linear regression models showed that normative adjustment and the type of norms had a direct inverse effect on both types of behaviour, while pro-sociality only had an effect on defence. In groups with pro-bullying norms, a greater effect of normative adjustment was observed for involvement in defence and aggression, and pro-social skills were associated with aggression. These results suggest the need to work on moral, social and emotional elements to improve school climate in schools.

El acoso escolar es un fenómeno grupal en el que los escolares asumen roles diferentes. Aunque determinadas características contextuales juegan un papel fundamental en su evolución, aún son escasos los estudios longitudinales que exploran cómo interactúan dichos factores. El presente estudio tiene como objetivos explorar los diferentes tipos de agrupamientos de clases según las normas de acoso escolar y examinar el efecto del tipo de norma, el ajuste social y normativo y la prosocialidad, así como la interacción de las normas del grupo con la implicación en la agresión y defensa de la víctima en situaciones de acoso. Un total de 3,358 escolares de secundaria (50.71 % chicas, Medad = 13 años, DT = 1.34) participaron en el estudio. Se identificaron cuatro grupos de normas hacia el acoso: antibullying, en contra del acoso, en contra pero sin defender activamente, neutral y a favor del acoso. Los modelos de regresión lineal univariados mostraron que el ajuste normativo y el tipo de normas tenían un efecto directo inverso en ambas conductas, mientras que la prosocialidad solo tuvo un efecto inverso sobre la conducta de defensa. En los grupos con normas antiacoso se observó un mayor efecto del ajuste normativo en la implicación en la defensa y agresión y que las habilidades prosociales se asociaban con la agresión. Los resultados sugieren que es necesario trabajar los aspectos morales, sociales y emocionales para mejorar el clima escolar.

Pro-sociality and happiness across national cultures: A hierarchical linear model.

Research from both Empirical studies and Positive Psychology has indicated that pro-sociality has a universal effect on happiness; however, this does not take into account the national or cultural differences of a given country. The hierarchical linear model (HLM) is employed in this study to investigate the link between pro-sociality and happiness at the individual level, as well as the effect of four national cultures (i.e., power distance, individualism versus collectivism, masculinity versus femininity, and uncertainty avoidance) at the country/territory level on this relationship. This study utilizes the public World Value Survey dataset, which adopts random probability representative adult samples from 32 countries or territories (N = 53,618; Mage = 44.10, SD = 16.51). Results suggest that pro-sociality is associated with happiness, even when accounting for demographics and the country/territory code. Additionally, the country/territory level displays variations in happiness, which can be partially explained by masculinity versus femininity (positively) and uncertainty avoidance (negatively). Moreover, the connection between pro-sociality and happiness is not influenced by national cultures. This research provides evidence for the universal happiness reward of pro-sociality. Implications, restrictions, and potential future research directions are discussed.

Stability of pro-sociality and trust amid the Covid-19: panel data from the Netherlands.

The Covid-19 has impacted most spheres of life and continues to influence the future course of socio-economic decisions. The effects of pandemic and virus contraction on the stability of social preferences are however relatively less know. This study examines the effects of the Covid-19 on pro-sociality and general trust by using the LISS panel data (time frame: 2019-2020) from the Netherlands. The fixed effects panel regressions show that pro-social behavior and general trust do not differ pre-and-after the Covid-19. The article further analyzes the stability of pro-sociality and general trust among people who unfortunately contracted the Covid-19 virus and the uninfected ones (time frame: 2019-2020) using difference-in-differences (DD) method to infer a causal effect of infections on preferences. The DD analysis also leads to insignificant causal effect of virus contractions on pro-sociality and trust. However, the sub-group analysis shows a positive causal impact of infections on trust for respondents above 60 years. Overall, both fixed effects regressions and DD analysis suggest that pro-sociality and to a large extent general trust in the Netherlands are stable despite the negative Covid-19 shock.

Does pro-sociality or trust better predict staying home behavior during the Covid-19?

Voluntary compliance of preventive and mitigation measures due to social concerns can play a crucial role in slowing down the spread of the Covid-19. The existing economic models for disease spread however do not direct a lot of focus on the possible role of pro-social behavior and general trust in predicting preventive behaviors amid the Covid-19. Therefore, this study analyzes whether pro-sociality and general trust measured in the short run (2020 and 2019) and in the long run (2015 and 2010) predict attitudes towards the stay home behavior and the intended stay home behavior in case the government mandates it due to the Covid-19 in the Netherlands. The results suggest that these preferences positively influence attitudes towards staying home behavior. However, trust in comparison to pro-sociality is a stable and robust predictor of stay home attitudes both in the short as well as long run. On the other hand, neither trust nor pro-sociality influences the intended stay home behavior in case the government mandates the lockdown, and it is most likely due to the timing of the survey coinciding with a significant drop in the Covid-19 infections and easing out of the lockdown restrictions by the Dutch government.

#ChurchInAction: more than a hashtag, it is an activism.

In a letter to the editor, the authors have explored how the social media hashtag #ChurchInAction has become a narrative of the Philippine Church's social engagement with the poor during the pandemic and the public perception of its dynamism. But I argue that there is more to it than its perceived meaning. The hashtag plays a more political role as a symbol of activism against the emerging anti-church sentiment at the onset of intense lockdowns during the pandemic. More than just a display of Church prosocial engagement, the #ChurchInAction is embedded with connective and collective identity as in any activism against the critics of the Catholic institution.

Mediators explaining radical right voting patterns of Christians in Europe: Attitudes toward immigrants, values, or social capital?

Previous studies show that radical right parties in Europe receive relatively low levels of supports from Christian voters, despite that Christian value is highlighted in the European radical right agenda. However, the mechanism remains largely untested. The study investigates the factors underlying Christians voting or not voting for populist radical right parties across Europe, using Round 8 European Social Survey data. It is shown that there is no general relationship between Christian religiosity and radical right voting across European countries. In most countries, Christians are neither more nor less likely to vote for the radical right parties compared to the non-religious. When Christians are underrepresented in radical right supporters, it can hardly be explained by tolerance towards immigrants, pro-social values or social capital presumed to be fostered by Christian religion and church engagement. In some other cases, where Christians are more likely to vote for radical right parties, it is likely to be driven by anti-immigrant attitudes, authoritarian values and moral conservative values. In addition, Christians could have been more mobilizable for radical right parties due to their authoritarian and moral conservative values, which have not been fully capitalized. The study suggests that Christian religiosity does not serve as an "antidote" to the radical right. Tolerance towards immigrants, pro-social values or social capital are rarely the mechanisms driving European Christians away from supporting radical right parties.

The Effects of Contact With Nature During Outdoor Environmental Education on Students' Wellbeing, Connectedness to Nature and Pro-sociality.

Experiences of contact with nature in school education might be beneficial for promoting ecological lifestyles and the wellbeing of children, families, and teachers. Many theories and empirical evidence on restorative environments, as well as on the foundations of classical pedagogical approaches, recognize the value of the direct experience with natural elements, and the related psychological and educational outcomes (e.g., positive emotions, autonomy, self-efficacy, empathy). In this work we present two studies focusing on the contact with nature in outdoor education interventions with primary and secondary school students in Italy. A questionnaire measuring connectedness to nature, psycho-physical wellbeing, pro-environmental attitudes, students' life satisfaction, pro-social behavior, empathy and anxiety was completed before and after the education program by the participants to the intervention group and by students of a control group. The students in the intervention groups (154 in study 1 and 170 in study 2) participated in environmental education programs consisting in guided activities in contact with the nature during four visits in one of two natural protected areas. The students in the control groups (253 in study 1 and 168 in study 2) attended the same schools as the intervention group but they were not involved in the environmental education program. The students in both the groups completed the questionnaire in the same weeks of the year. Findings show that taking part to the outdoor education program has positive outcomes on psycho-physical wellbeing, on connectedness to nature and on pro-social behavior of students in the intervention group, compared to the control group. The implications related to the effectiveness of outdoor education interventions and future directions of research and practice in environmental psychology and education are discussed.

The evolution of morality and the role of commitment.

A considerable share of the literature on the evolution of human cooperation considers the question why we have not evolved to play the Nash equilibrium in prisoners' dilemmas or public goods games. In order to understand human morality and pro-social behaviour, we suggest that it would actually be more informative to investigate why we have not evolved to play the subgame perfect Nash equilibrium in sequential games, such as the ultimatum game and the trust game. The 'rationally irrational' behaviour that can evolve in such games gives a much better match with actual human behaviour, including elements of morality such as honesty, responsibility and sincerity, as well as the more hostile aspects of human nature, such as anger and vengefulness. The mechanism at work here is commitment, which does not need population structure, nor does it need interactions to be repeated. We argue that this shift in focus can not only help explain why humans have evolved to know wrong from right, but also why other animals, with similar population structures and similar rates of repetition, have not evolved similar moral sentiments. The suggestion that the evolutionary function of morality is to help us commit to otherwise irrational behaviour stems from the work of Robert Frank (American Economic Review, 77(4), 593-604, 1987; Passions within reason: The strategic role of the emotions, WW Norton, 1988), which has played a surprisingly modest role in the scientific debate to date.

Do dogs rescue their owners from a stressful situation? A behavioral and physiological assessment.

Rescue behavior is considered a type of pro-social response, defined as a voluntary action directed to benefit another individual who is in a stressful or dangerous situation. In two experiments, we investigated whether dogs would rescue their owners when the person was trapped inside a wooden box and emitted clear signs of stress. The performance of these dogs was compared against that of a control group in which the owners remained calm while trapped. In addition, to assess if training modulated this behavior, we tested a group of dogs from the military trained in search and rescue tasks (Experiment 1). Results showed that dogs opened the box more frequently when the owner pretended to be stressed than when calm. Training shortened latencies to open the door but not the frequency of the behavior. In Experiment 2, we investigated if emotional contagion could be a possible mechanism underlying dogs' rescue responses by measuring dogs' behavior, heart rate, and saliva cortisol level in the stressed and calm conditions, and also controlled for obedience by having the calm owners call their pets while trapped. We replicated the findings of Experiment 1 as more dogs opened the door in the stressed owner condition than in the calm condition. In addition, we observed an increase in heart rate across trials in the stressed condition and a decrease across trials in the calm condition, but no differences in cortisol levels or stress-related behaviors between conditions. In brief, we found evidence that approximately half of the dogs without previous training showed spontaneous rescue behaviors directed to their owners. Neither was this behavior motivated by obedience nor by the motivation to re-establish social contact with the owner. We conclude that emotional contagion is a plausible mechanism underlying dogs' rescue behavior in the present protocol.

I'll just watch: Do the pro-social effects of coordination really generalize to non-actors?

Moving in time together has been shown to cultivate pro-social effects in co-actors, such as cooperation and helping. But less is known about who these effects apply to - whether they are restricted only to co-actors, or whether they generalize to those not involved in the coordination. One difference between past work finding generalized vs. restricted effects is whether these "outsiders" were present for the coordination or not. The present study explores whether the pro-social effects of coordination are seen towards observers as well as co-actors, and whether the absence or presence of observers during the coordination is a determining factor. Results show that greater cooperation following coordination is only seen amongst co- actors, regardless of whether the observers were present during the task or not. Findings are discussed in the context of the literature and alternative explanations for research showing generalized effects are suggested.

Money for me and money for friend: An ERP study of social reward processing in adolescents and adults.

Peer relations during adolescence contribute significantly to the development of socio-cognitive skills and pro-sociality. The current study probed the characteristics of adolescent socio-cognitive processing through a card game where they earn money for self and friend. We investigated the choice preference and temporal dynamics of information processing by measuring ERP responses to wins or losses (valence) directed toward self and friend (recipient). Choice data showed that despite adults and adolescents earning equivalent amounts across recipients combined, adults won significantly more for self than a friend; no such difference was found in adolescents. The ERPs in response to choice outcomes showed that the valence information was processed earlier (at P2) in adults, while it was processed later (at P3) in adolescents. Furthermore, a strong effect of recipient was present in adults later in the time course (at P3), while such an effect was weak in adolescents; if any, adolescents showed sensitivity to recipient information earlier at P2. These ERP data suggest a relatively equal allocation of the P3-mediated attentional process to both self and friend's outcomes in adolescents, which parallels the choice behavior. Collectively our results characterize adolescent pro-sociality toward friends, reflecting the importance of peer relationship during this unique developmental period.

Collective Narcissism and In-Group Satisfaction Are Associated With Different Emotional Profiles and Psychological Wellbeing.

The social identity approach to wellbeing posits that social identifications provide psychological resources that contribute to individual wellbeing. Unless individuals identify with stigmatized groups or groups whose norms prescribe damaging behaviors, identifying with groups seems beneficial. This article explores the possibility that the different ways individuals approach the same social identity (labeled collective narcissism vs. in-group satisfaction) may be differentially associated with wellbeing. Results of four studies indicate that collective narcissism (a belief that the in-group's exceptionality is not sufficiently appreciated by others) vs. in-group satisfaction, (a belief that the in-group is of a high value), although positively correlated, are associated with different emotional profiles. In Study 1A (N = 570, in Poland) and Study 1B (N = 778, in the United States), collective narcissism was uniquely positively associated with negative emotionality, whereas in-group satisfaction was positively associated with positive emotionality and negatively associated with negative emotionality. In Study 2 (N = 569, in Poland), collective narcissism and in-group satisfaction had opposite unique links with social connectedness, gratitude and self-criticism. In Study 3 (N = 393, in Poland), collective narcissism, but not in-group satisfaction, was associated with sensory processing sensitivity, genetically determined hypersensitivity to negative stimuli. Collective narcissism was associated with life satisfaction only via its link to in-group satisfaction. Together these results suggest that dispositional negative emotionality may incline individuals toward collective narcissism. The positive overlap with in-group satisfaction may link collective narcissism to the benefits of social identification and wellbeing.

The Choreography of Group Affiliation.

When two people move in synchrony, they become more social. Yet it is not clear how this effect scales up to larger numbers of people. Does a group need to move in unison to affiliate, in what we term unitary synchrony; or does affiliation arise from distributed coordination, patterns of coupled movements between individual members of a group? We developed choreographic tasks that manipulated movement synchrony without explicitly instructing groups to move in unison. Wrist accelerometers measured group movement dynamics and we applied cross-recurrence analysis to distinguish the temporal features of emergent unitary synchrony (simultaneous movement) and distributed coordination (coupled movement). Participants' unitary synchrony did not predict pro-social behavior, but their distributed coordination predicted how much they liked each other, how they felt toward their group, and how much they conformed to each other's opinions. The choreography of affiliation arises from distributed coordination of group movement dynamics.

An experiment on individual 'parochial altruism' revealing no connection between individual 'altruism' and individual 'parochialism'.

Is parochial altruism an attribute of individual behavior? This is the question we address with an experiment. We examine whether the individual pro-sociality that is revealed in the public goods and trust games when interacting with fellow group members helps predict individual parochialism, as measured by the in-group bias (i.e., the difference in these games in pro-sociality when interacting with own group members as compared with members of another group). We find that it is not. An examination of the Big-5 personality predictors of each behavior reinforces this result: they are different. In short, knowing how pro-social individuals are with respect to fellow group members does not help predict their parochialism.

Emotions affect the recognition of hand gestures.

The body is closely tied to the processing of social and emotional information. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a relationship between emotions and social attitudes conveyed through gestures exists. Thus, we tested the effect of pro-social (i.e., happy face) and anti-social (i.e., angry face) emotional primes on the ability to detect socially relevant hand postures (i.e., pictures depicting an open/closed hand). In particular, participants were required to establish, as quickly as possible, if the test stimulus (i.e., a hand posture) was the same or different, compared to the reference stimulus (i.e., a hand posture) previously displayed in the computer screen. Results show that facial primes, displayed between the reference and the test stimuli, influence the recognition of hand postures, according to the social attitude implicitly related to the stimulus. We found that perception of pro-social (i.e., happy face) primes resulted in slower RTs in detecting the open hand posture as compared to the closed hand posture. Vice-versa, perception of the anti-social (i.e., angry face) prime resulted in slower RTs in detecting the closed hand posture compared to the open hand posture. These results suggest that the social attitude implicitly conveyed by the displayed stimuli might represent the conceptual link between emotions and gestures.