The current studies examined the relationship between the penchant to daydream about helping others and prosocial traits and behaviour. We reasoned that fantasising about prosocial acts should be positively associated with a more prosocial disposition and real behaviour. Across both studies, the findings suggest that people who exhibit prosocial characteristics (e.g., empathic concern, fantasy/fictional empathy, moral reasoning) are more likely to fantasise about prosocial behaviour, and these characteristics are reliably associated with increased helping behaviours. From Study 1, the correlational results showed that people higher in agreeableness exhibited a stronger tendency to engage in prosocial fantasising, and empathy, in part, mediated the relationship. The experimental results from Study 2 conceptually support those from Study 1; when prompted to fantasise about prosocial behaviour, those higher in agreeableness and openness to experience engaged in more helping behaviour, whereas in a control condition, no helping differences emerged. Finding that empathic concern was most consistently related to daydreaming is consistent with the theory in that people are more intrinsically motivated to promote other's welfare at a personal cost when they feel empathy. Engaging in prosocial fantasising may increase empathy, which in turn, may enhance one's prosocial disposition and increase one's helping behaviour.
#1Zhe Feng(U of T: University of Toronto)H-Index: 1
#2Shelby Logan(U of T: University of Toronto)H-Index: 1
Last. Dennis Gaffin(Buffalo State College)H-Index: 2
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The present study explores imagination in a cross-cultural context through an original 25-item questionnaire. A cross-national sample of 940 respondents included 336 participants from North America...
Last. Ann E. Hoover(University of South Carolina Upstate)H-Index: 3
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The search for the prosocial personality has been long and controversial. The current research explores the general patterns underlying prosocial decisions, linking personality, emotion, and overt prosocial behavior. Using a multimethod approach, we explored the links between the Big Five dimensions of personality and prosocial responding. Across three studies, we found that agreeableness was the dimension of personality most closely associated with emotional reactions to victims in need of help...
Across six studies, we validated a new measure of helpful and hurtful behaviors, the Tangram Help/Hurt Task. Studies 1 to 3 provided cross-sectional correlational convergent and discriminant validity evidence for the Tangram Task using college-based and adult online samples. Study 4 revealed that previously validated empathy primes increase helpful behaviors on the Tangram Task. Studies 5 and 6 revealed that previously validated provocation manipulations increase hurtful behaviors on the Tangram...
#1Meghan L. Meyer(UCLA: University of California, Los Angeles)H-Index: 16
#2Carrie L. Masten(UCLA: University of California, Los Angeles)H-Index: 23
Last. Shihui Han(PKU: Peking University)H-Index: 66
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Two competing views implicate interdependence in empathy. One suggests that interdependence may generally enhance empathy (Woltin et al., British Journal of Social Psychology 50:553–562, 2011), whereas another suggests that interdependence enhances empathy for targets with whom one is in a relationship, at the cost of decreasing empathy for strangers (Markus and Kitayama, Perspectives on Psychological Science 5(4):420–430, 2010). Here, we show evidence in support of the latter account. We observ...
Last. Ben C. P. Lam(Iowa State University)H-Index: 11
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Despite recent growth of research on the effects of prosocial media, processes underlying these effects are not well understood. Two studies explored theoretically relevant mediators and moderators of the effects of prosocial media on helping. Study 1 examined associations among prosocial- and violent-media use, empathy, and helping in samples from seven countries. Prosocial-media use was positively associated with helping. This effect was mediated by empathy and was similar across cultures. Stu...
Personality psychology has recognized a fundamental 5-factor structure that has integrated and organized theory and research. Nevertheless, personality-like differences beyond that structure have been identified. In heretofore unrelated research, dispositional empathy has been an essential construct in understanding human development, behavior, and interpersonal relationships. Addressing a gap in the literature, we map multidimensional dispositional empathy into 2 versions of the 5-factor space....
#2Silvia Osswald(LMU: Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)H-Index: 8
Last. Markus Brauer(CNRS: Centre national de la recherche scientifique)H-Index: 28
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Past research provided abundant evidence that exposure to violent video games increases aggressive tendencies and decreases prosocial tendencies. In contrast, research on the effects of exposure to prosocial video games has been relatively sparse. The present research found support for the hypothesis that exposure to prosocial video games is positively related to prosocial affect and negatively related to antisocial affect. More specifically, two studies revealed that playing a prosocial (relati...
Last. Renée M. Tobin(ISU: Illinois State University)H-Index: 10
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This research program explored links among prosocial motives, empathy, and helping behavior. Preliminary work found significant relations among components of self-reported empathy and personality (N = 223). In Study 1, the authors examined the generality of prosocial behavior across situations and group memberships of victims (N = 622). In Study 2, empathic focus and the victim's outgroup status were experimentally manipulated (N = 87). Study 3 (N = 245) replicated and extended Study 2 by collec...
#1Peter Fischer(LMU: Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)H-Index: 97
#2Tobias Greitemeyer(LMU: Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)H-Index: 57
Last. Dieter Frey(LMU: Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)H-Index: 61
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Previous research in bystander intervention found that the presence of other bystanders reduces helping behaviour in an emergency (bystander effect). This research was mainly conducted in the context of non-dangerous, non-violent emergencies. We hypothesize that the classic bystander effect does not occur in more dangerous situations because: a) they are faster and more clearly recognized as emergency situations; and b) higher costs for refusing help increase the accepted costs for helping. Foll...
Contrasting fantasies about the future with reflections on reality that impedes fantasy realization creates a tight link between expectations of success and forming commitments to self-improvement goals. This effect applies to both fantasies about a positive future contrasted with impeding negative reality as well as fantasies about a negative future contrasted with impeding positive reality. In Study 1, with 63 student participants, contrasting positive fantasies about benefiting from a vocatio...
