Searching for meaning is associated with costly prosociality

Abstract

The study of meaning in life has largely centered on its relationship with personal well-being, while a focus on how meaning is related to enhancing the well-being of others has received less research attention. Although searching for meaning may imply lower personal well-being, we find that meaning-seekers are more motivated to perform costly prosocial actions for the sake of others’ well-being, given the perceived meaningfulness of these behaviors. Studies 1–4 (N = 780) show that meaning-seeking correlates with the motivation to engage in a range of costly prosocial behaviors. Meaning-seeking is further shown to be distinct from pursuing happiness in its relationship with costly prosociality (Study 2 & 3) and to share a stronger association with high-cost than low-cost prosociality (Study 3 & 4). Study 5 (N = 370; pre-registered) further shows that the search for meaning is related to costly prosocial behavior in the recent past. While our studies are cross-sectional, the pattern of findings suggests that seeking meaning (rather than happiness) may play an important role in motivating altruistic tendencies.

Awareness of meaning and quest for meaning: The mechanisms between future orientation and prosociality among youth during pandemic

“…In other words, the positive relationship of future orientation with prosocial tendency are partially explained by the presence of meaning and the search for meaning. These findings are consistent with the previous studies regarding the positive associations between future orientation and presence of meaning (Hicks et al, 2012;Baumeister et al, 2020;Miao et al, 2021), and search for meaning (Leshkovska and Shterjovska, 2014) as well as the positive associations between prosocial tendency and presence of meaning (Van Tongeren et al, 2016;Klein, 2017;Liu and Zhang, 2020), and search for meaning (Zimmerman and Rappaport, 1988;Ohmer, 2007;Brown et al, 2012;Lin, 2019;Dakin et al, 2021).…”

“…Particularly, meaning-seekers show the strong intention to engage in civic activities ( Lin, 2019 ) because these activities can enhance their sense of meaning through increasing social connectedness ( Ohmer, 2007 ), self-esteem ( Brown et al, 2012 ), and sense of competence in organizing their lives ( Zimmerman and Rappaport, 1988 ), which are highly associated with meaning in life ( Heine et al, 2006 ). In addition, meaning-seekers engage in high-cost prosocial acts like kidney donation ( Dakin et al, 2021 ) probably because these prosocial behaviors with higher costs are viewed as having more valuable and significant meaning ( Olivola and Shafir, 2011 ; Inzlicht et al, 2018 ).…”

The Mediating Role of Prosocial Behavior and Meaning in Life in the Relationship Between Religiosity and Attitude Towards People with Intellectual Disability (ID) of Hong Kong Young Adults

“…Individuals are motived to offer prosocial behavior to mitigate threats to their meaning system (Igou et al, 2020). Meaning seekers are more motivated to engage prosocial behavior for the sake of others' well-being (Dakin et al, 2021).…”

“…With higher achievement of meaning in life, people are getting satisfied and have a motivation and attitude to contribute and change the society (Damon et al, 2003). Moreover, meaning seekers have more motivation to perform costly prosocial behaviors (Dakin et al, 2021). People with high motivation to search for meaning are more willing to make personal sacrifices in prosocial behaviors which are beneficial for others because they tend to view such behaviors as source of meaning with community-oriented goals.…”

Employee Empowerment and HR Flexibility in Information Technology SMEs

“…There were six straightliners. Further, following common practice, [85][86][87] responses completed in one third of the median completion time were classified as speeders. There were five speeders.…”