PSYC 215 Chapter Notes - Chapter 14: Empathic Concern, Prefrontal Cortex, Pluralistic Ignorance
13 Apr 2013
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Document Summary
Altruism: unselfish behavior that benefits others without regard to consequences for the self. Humans are prone to feelings of compassion that allow us to act in such altruistic ways, although sometimes we don"t act on these feelings. In any altruistic actions, several motives are likely to be in play. Two of these motives are essentially selfish (egoistic) and the third is more purely oriented toward unselfishly benefiting another person. The first selfish motive is the social rewards motive: benefits like praise, positive attention, tangible rewards, honors and gratitude that may be gained from helping others. The second is the personal distress motive: a motive for helping those in distress that may arise from a need to reduce our own distress. Ex: people feel pain when they see others in pain. Lastly, there is empathic concern: identifying with another person-feeling and understanding what that person in experiencing-accompanied by the intention to help the person in need.
