PSYC 2360 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Personal Distress, Agreeableness, Motivation
29 Apr 2016
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Document Summary
Many people do things on a regular basis to help others: donating money, volunteering time, putting lives in danger to save people. Even small things can motivate prosocial behaviours. Evolutionary factors: according to the evolutionary perspective, people act in an altruistic way when such be- haviour will help ensure the survival of their genes, which can then be passed on. Kinship selection: why parents may self-sacrifice in order to benefit their children. Reciprocal prosocial behaviour: people help others to increase the odds that they, in turn, will be helped by those others. Children who are high on both empathy and moral reasoning - more likely to engage in helping behaviour vs. Some religious teachings emphasize the important of engaging in cooperative and prosocial behaviour; other reli- gions emphasize the importance of treating others like you"d like to be treated. Religious beliefs are sometimes associated with more altruistic behaviour.
