Learning to interpret one's own outcome as unjustified amplifies altruistic compensation: a training study

Abstract

Interpretational tendencies in ambiguous situations were investigated as causal mechanisms of altruistic compensation. We used a training procedure to induce a tendency to interpret one's own advantages as unjustified. In a subsequent mixed-game, participants had to decide whether to invest their own money to compensate a victim of a norm violation. The amount of one's own resources invested as an altruistic compensation was enhanced after the training procedure compared to controls. These findings suggest that interpretational patterns with regard to injustice determine prosocial behavior. The training procedure offers a potential intervention strategy for enhancing altruistic compensation in bystander situations in which people must invest their own resources to restore justice.

How Victim Sensitivity leads to Uncooperative Behavior via Expectancies of Injustice

“…Further research should determine if the tendency to expect injustice displayed by high victim-sensitive persons can be permanently reduced through extended training to yield a beneficial increase in cooperative behavior. One study that has taken a preliminary step in this direction showed that participants acted more prosocially in an economic game after being trained to expect own unjustified advantages ( Maltese et al, 2013 ). Highly victim-sensitive persons may benefit from a similar prosocial training that directs their thoughts on disadvantaged others and away from the expectancy of own disadvantages resulting from the perception of others mean intentions.…”

Predicting Pro-environmental Intention and Behavior Based on Justice Sensitivity, Moral Disengagement, and Moral Emotions – Results of Two Quota-Sampling Surveys

“…Given these diametrical effects of pro-social and pro-self sensitivities, it seems promising to investigate whether the prosocial perspectives of justice sensitivity can be trained and increased. A preliminary study in this area (Maltese et al, 2013) shows that specific training can teach people to recognize the consequences of their behavior as being unjust in ambiguous situations. In a subsequent game, this classification led people to use more of their own resources to restore justice, in contrast to the control group.…”

Sensitivity to Injustice of Politicians and Voters

“…Baumert and Schmitt (2016) report on the first approaches to inducing justicesensitive information processing. When people are trained to evaluate their own advantages as unjust, they invest more of their own resources to support people who are treated unjustly by others (Maltese et al, 2013). In contrast, the anticipation of unfair treatment tends to lead people to behave uncooperatively in subsequent situations (Maltese et al, 2016).…”