Evidence for Altruism: Toward a Pluralism of Prosocial Motives
Psychological Inquiry 2 (2):107-122 (1991)
| Abstract | Psychologists have long assumed that the motivation for all intentional action, including all action intended to benefit others, is egoistic. People benefit others because, ultimately, to do so benefits themselves. The empathy-altruism hypothesis challenges this assumption. It claims that empathic emotion evokes truly altruistic motivation, motivation with an ultimate goal ofbenefiting not the self but the person for whom empathy is felt. Logical and psychological distinctions between egoism and altruism are reviewed, providing a conceptualframeworkfor empirical tests for the existence of altruism. Results of empirical tests to date are summarized; these results provide impressive support for the empathy-altruism hypothesis. We conclude that the popular and parsimonious explanation ofprosocial motivation in terms ofuniversal egoism must give way to a pluralistic explanation that includes altruism as well as egoism. Implications of such a pluralism are briefly noted, not only for our understanding ofprosocial motivation but also for our understanding of human nature and of the emotion-motivation link. | |||||||||
| Keywords | altruism egoism empathy | |||||||||
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Cillian McBride & Jonathan Seglow (2003). Introduction: Egoism, Altruism and Impartiality. Res Publica 9 (3):213-222.
Alejandro Rosas (2002). Psychological and Evolutionary Evidence for Altruism. Biology and Philosophy 17 (1):93-107.
C. Daniel Batson (2000). Unto Others: A Service... And a Disservice. Journal of Consciousness Studies 7 (1-2):207-210.
Christine Clavien (2012). Altruistic Emotional Motivation: An Argument in Favour of Psychological Altruism. In Katie Plaisance & Thomas Reydon (eds.), Boston Studies in Philosophy of Science. Springer Press.
Bernard A. O. Williams (1973). Egoism and Altruism. In Problems of the Self. Cambridge University Press.
C. Daniel Batson (2011). Altruism in Humans. Oxford University Press.
Joshua May (2011). Relational Desires and Empirical Evidence Against Psychological Egoism. European Journal of Philosophy 19 (1):39–58.
C. Daniel Batson (1992). Experimental Tests for the Existence of Altruism. PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association 1992:69 - 78.
C. Daniel Batson (1991). The Altruism Question: Toward a Social-Psychological Answer. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
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