Pay it Forward: Elevation Leads to Altruistic Behavior

/ Author:  / Reviewed by: Joseph V. Madia, MD

Seeing someone perform a virtuous deed, especially if the person is helping someone else, makes us feel good, often eliciting a warm, fuzzy feeling in our chest.
This positive, uplifting emotion, known as elevation, might make us feel great, but is it enough to get us to go out and perform good acts ourselves? According to new findings reported in Psychological Science, the answer may be yes.

Psychological scientists Simone Schnall, of the University of Cambridge, Jean Roper, of the University of Plymouth, and Daniel M.T. Fessler, of the University of California, Los Angeles, wanted to investigate the influence of elevation on behavior. Volunteers viewed either a neutral TV clip showing scenes from a nature documentary or an uplifting TV clip, a segment from The Oprah Winfrey Show in which musicians thanking their mentors, designed to induce feelings of elevation. The participants then wrote an essay describing what they watched. As they received their payment and a receipt, they were to indicate if they would be willing to participate in an additional study.

The results revealed that participants who watched the uplifting TV clip were more likely to volunteer for another research study than volunteers who saw the neutral TV clip, suggesting elevation may make us more willing to help others.

However, anybody can say they will volunteer for a subsequent study or would be willing to help another person. The researchers wanted to see if elevation can result in actual helping behavior.

In the next experiment, a different set of volunteers watched one of three TV clips: the neutral TV clip, the uplifting TV clip used previously or a clip from a British comedy, intended to induce mirth. After they viewed the TV clip, the research assistant conducting the study pretended to have problems opening a computer file required for the experiment. She told the volunteers they were free to leave, but as they were leaving, she asked them if they would be willing to complete a questionnaire for another study. Unbeknownst to the volunteers, the actual experiment was measuring whether or not they helped with the additional study. The researcher noted that the questionnaire was boring and that the volunteers could leave whenever they wanted.

The results of this second experiment were striking: The participants who viewed the uplifting TV clip spent almost twice as long helping the research assistant than participants who saw the neutral TV clip or the comedy clip, indicating elevation may lead to helping behavior.

The authors conclude that "by eliciting elevation, even brief exposure to other individuals' prosocial behavior motivates altruism, thus potentially providing an avenue for increasing the general level of prosociality in society."

Contact:
Barbara Isanski
202-293-9300
bisanski@psychologicalscience.org

Review Date: 
September 21, 2010