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Prosocial Behavior Increases Well-Being and Vitality Even Without Contact with the Beneficiary: Causal and Behavioral Evidence

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Prosocial Behavior Increases Well-Being and Vitality Even Without Contact with the Beneficiary: Causal and Behavioral Evidence Motiv Emot (2016) 40:351–357 DOI 10.1007/s11031-016-9552-z ORIGINAL PAPER Prosocial behavior increases well-being and vitality even without contact with the beneficiary: Causal and behavioral evidence 1 2,3 Frank Martela • Richard M. Ryan Published online: 28 March 2016 Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016 Abstract A number of studies have shown that prosocial Introduction behavior is associated with enhanced well-being, but most prior experimental studies have involved actual or The association between prosocial behavior and well-being potential face-to-face contact with the beneficiary. To has become a target of increasing amount of empirical establish that it is prosocial behavior itself, and not only work (e.g. Aknin et al. 2013a; Poulin et al. 2012; Shariff an increased sense of social relatedness to the recipient and Norenzayan 2007). In addition to extensive amount of that improves well-being, participants (n = 76) were cross-sectional work connecting various forms of prosocial invited to play a simple computer game, where half were behavior with well-being (partially reviewed in Piliavin made aware of a chance to have an anonymous prosocial 2003; Post 2005), a number of studies that have used impact through gameplay. As compared to the control experimental manipulation have established that prosocial condition, this group experienced more positive affect, behavior leads to increased well-being (e.g. Harris 1977; meaningfulness and marginally more vitality. Going Weinstein and Ryan 2010; Williamson and Clark 1989). beyond self-reported outcomes, they also demonstrated However, most causal studies to date have involved better post-game performance on a subsequent Stroop direct or potential face-to-face contact with the beneficiary, task, providing behavioral evidence for the positive where the improved well-being could arguably also be the effects of prosocial behavior. Also supported was the result of increased sense of belonging and relatedness hypothesis that these positive effects of prosocial behav- resulting from connecting with the other person (cf. ior on well-being were mediated by subjectively assessed Baumeister and Leary 1995; Weinstein and Ryan 2010). autonomy and competence need satisfactions. Indeed, Aknin et al. (2013b) showed in three studies that prosocial spending leads to stronger improvements in Keywords Prosocial behavior Á Prosocial giving Á happiness in situations that actually promote social con- Prosocial impact Á Well-being Á Self-determination theory nection. Only a few papers have addressed this shortcom- ing: Aknin et al. (2013a) offered participants in Canada and South Africa a chance to purchase a goody bag either for themselves (control condition) or for a sick child at a nearby children’s hospital (prosocial condition). In both countries those engaged in prosocial spending reported & Frank Martela [email protected] improved positive affect as compared to the personal spenders. Another study using similar goody bag task Richard M. Ryan [email protected] replicated these findings measuring also observer-rated mood of participants (Aknin et al. 2014). Third study 1 University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland offered more mixed results: Participants were asked for a 2 Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, Australian donation to either Spread the Net charity organization or Catholic University, Banyo, QLD, Australia UNICEF charity organization (Aknin et al. 2013c). Larger 3 University of Rochester, Rochester, NY, USA donations to Spread the Net predicted higher subjective 123 352 Motiv Emot (2016) 40:351–357 well-being, while larger donations to UNICEF didn’t, a (benevolence condition), whereas the other half were not result the researchers attributed to the more concrete and aware of this fact (control condition). descriptive appeal made by Spread the Net organization. We also wanted to have wider range of outcome measures The current paper uses an anonymous prosocial task to than most existing studies, including a performance-based expand on these findings in a couple of ways. First, we aim measure. Thus, in addition to measures of positive affect, to measure a wider range of well-being outcomes: In negative affect and vitality, we also measured meaningfulness, addition to positive and negative affect, we measure also game interest/enjoyment, and performance on a subsequent vitality, meaning and interest/enjoyment. Secondly, the Stroop task. It was predicted that those in the benevolence existing research—with the exception of neurological condition would experience more vitality, meaningfulness and research by Harbaugh et al. (2007) and Gray’s (2010) interest/enjoyment in the game than people in the control research on moral transformation—has used self-reports of condition. Further, as vitality and ego depletion are both about mood and well-being as outcomes. The present study aims energy available to the self (Ryan and Deci 2008), it was to extend the literature by providing a causal study of hypothesized that people in benevolence condition would prosocial behavior that involves no contact with the ben- actually have more energy left to perform better in the subse- eficiary, and that includes a behavioral outcome—perfor- quent Stroop task, which is often used as a measure of ego mance in a Stroop task—in addition to subjective well- depletion (e.g. Gailliot et al. 2007;Kaze´netal.2015). being outcomes. In addition, we wanted to see whether the increased Third, in addition to asking whether prosocial behavior beneficence satisfaction and increased satisfaction of the leads to well-being, the present study further aims to ask three psychological needs of autonomy, competence, and why prosocial behavior improves well-being (cf. Martela relatedness from SDT (Deci and Ryan 2000) would mediate and Ryan 2015). In particular, we wanted to look whether this relationship. the three psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness from self-determination theory (SDT; Deci and Ryan 2000) would mediate the relations between Methods prosocial behavior and well-being outcomes in an experi- mental setting. In a number of studies, Weinstein and Ryan Participants (2010) have showed that autonomy, competence, and relatedness mediate the positive well-being effects of With the aim of recruiting around 80 participants, 79 prosocial behavior, with all three needs having an inde- University students participated in exchange for extra pendent contribution. Here we aim to replicate these find- course credit. Of these 64 % were women, and the average ings using a novel type of manipulation that doesn’t age was 20.4. The majority identified as Caucasian (45 %) involve any face-to-face contact with the beneficiary and or Asian (38 %), with the rest being African American with new types of well-being outcomes. (11 %), Hispanic (4 %) or preferring not to say (3 %). 3 The present study thus aims to manipulate prosocial subjects were omitted due to technical problems in the behavior in a situation that doesn’t involve any contact gameplay, leaving a final sample size of 76, of which 34 with the beneficiary with two main hypotheses: First, we were in the benevolence condition and 42 in the control propose that prosocial behavior will increase the benefac- condition. tor’s well-being and vitality as measured both by subjective evaluation and objective outcomes. Second, we propose Procedure that this positive effect is mediated by the satisfaction of the three psychological needs for autonomy, competence, Participants were invited to a computer lab in small groups and relatedness. of eight or less, where they were seated in front of shielded computers. Half were randomly assigned to the beneficence condition, the other half to the control condition. The Present study procedure for all participants was the same: They were first asked to play the word-related game for 20 min. After- In the present study we adopted an experimental design wards, they were asked to answer a short survey about their where participants had a real life possibility to contribute to experiences during game-play, after which they conducted others, but where there would be no contact with the a Stroop task with 24 trials to measure ego depletion recipient of that help. Accordingly, all participants played (Gailliot et al. 2007). the same word-related computer game, but half were The game, freerice.com, is simple and straightforward: informed that for every correct answer the game donates the player is given a word and four alternatives, and one’s rice to the United Nations World Food Program task is to click on the synonymous word. The difference 123 Motiv Emot (2016) 40:351–357 353 between the two conditions was that only in the benefi- positive (e.g. happy, pleasant, a = .93), and 6 negative cence condition were the participants made aware of the emotions (e.g. sad, unpleasant, a = .94) on a scale from 1 benevolent impact of their gameplay. (Very rarely or never) to 5 (Very often or Always). Vitality For the benevolence condition the instructions were as was assessed using five items (a = .92) from Subjective follows: Vitality Scale (SVS: Ryan and Frederick 1997). Interest/ enjoyment was assessed with two items (I enjoyed the This is a simple game where you will be asked to challenges this game provided & I would be interested in identify the correct synonym for the displayed word playing this game again, a = .85) taken from Sheldon and from four alternatives. For each answer you get right, Filak (2008), and rated on a scale from 1 to 7. Subjective the game automatically donates 10 grains of rice to meaningfulness of the experience was assessed with two the United Nations World Food Program. This food is items used by King and Hicks (2009) (‘‘The event was very distributed worldwide to those most in need. World meaningful to me’’; ‘‘This was a very significant experi- Food Program is the world’s largest humanitarian ence to me’’, a = .92) using ratings from 1 (not at all true) organization fighting hunger, and it helps over 90 to 7 (very true).
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