Social class and prosocial behavior: current evidence, caveats, and questions

Piff, Paul K.; Robinson, Angela R.

doi:10.1016/j.copsyc.2017.06.003

Cited by 112 publications

(124 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…(15), whereas we (23) found the opposite effect in a German sample (a country with lower inequality). The explanation for this moderating effect is that in less equal environments, higher income individuals perceive a wider gap between themselves and low-income individuals, which leads higher income individuals to have a sense of entitlement and ultimately reduces their prosocial behavior (14,20).…”

Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

“…What might explain the discrepant results? Piff and Robinson (20) argued that moderating variables might be responsible for the heterogeneous effects of social class on prosociality, thus qualifying the "having less, giving more" main effect reported by Piff et al (15). Indeed, Côté et al (14) identified such a moderator when they found that the negative effect of social class on prosociality could be observed only when economic inequality was high.…”

mentioning

confidence: 97%

“…On the other end of the continuum, the abundant resources enjoyed by upper-class individuals lead to an individualistic focus on their own internal states, goals, motivations, and emotions (15,16,18,19; recently reviewed in refs. 17,20,21).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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No evidence that economic inequality moderates the effect of income on generosity

Schmukle

Korndörfer²,

Egloff

2019

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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A landmark study published in PNAS [Côté S, House J, Willer R (2015) Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 112:15838-15843] showed that higher income individuals are less generous than poorer individuals only if they reside in a US state with comparatively large economic inequality. This finding might serve to reconcile inconsistent findings on the effect of social class on generosity by highlighting the moderating role of economic inequality. On the basis of the importance of replicating a major finding before readily accepting it as evidence, we analyzed the effect of the interaction between income and inequality on generosity in three large representative datasets. We analyzed the donating behavior of 27,714 US households (study 1), the generosity of 1,334 German individuals in an economic game (study 2), and volunteering to participate in charitable activities in 30,985 participants from 30 countries (study 3). We found no evidence for the postulated moderation effect in any study. This result is especially remarkable because (i) our samples were very large, leading to high power to detect effects that exist, and (ii) the cross-country analysis employed in study 3 led to much greater variability in economic inequality. These findings indicate that the moderation effect might be rather specific and cannot be easily generalized. Consequently, economic inequality might not be a plausible explanation for the heterogeneous results on the effect of social class on prosociality.social class | income | economic inequality | prosocial behavior | generosity E conomic inequality has been on the rise around the world for several decades (1, 2), and researchers from several disciplines have investigated the antecedents, correlates, and consequences of this increasing economic divide (3-5). Mostly negative effects have been reported, and not only in the economic domain but also including increases in health and social problems [e.g., increased drug use, higher obesity, more violent crimes, higher imprisonment rates, lower interpersonal trust (6, 7)], ultimately leading to lower levels of life satisfaction in the population (8-10) (but see refs. 11-13 for positive and null effects of inequality on well-being and happiness).An additional negative consequence was recently reported in PNAS, where Côté et al. (14) provided evidence that economic inequality leads higher income individuals to be less generous than low-income individuals. Their study is important for several reasons: (i) It has policy implications because the negative effects of economic inequality on outcomes that are desirable for a society are important issues for the public, (ii) it shows how a macroeconomic variable measured on the state level (economic inequality) can interact with a sociological variable (social class) to affect a psychological variable (prosocial behavior), and (iii) it has the potential to reconcile the debate on why findings on the association between social class and prosocial behavior have been inconsistent.This debate began with two influential psyc...

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Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 97%

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No evidence that economic inequality moderates the effect of income on generosity

Schmukle

Korndörfer²,

Egloff

2019

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…They have higher levels of inclusion at school (Veland et al, 2015 ), receive better grades (Lekholm and Cliffordson, 2008 ), and perform better on other achievement measures (Sirin, 2005 ). Furthermore, lower SES children engage in more prosocial behavior (Piff and Robinson, 2017 ), but they are also at higher risk of developing social problems (Bradley and Corwyn, 2002 ). Additionally, well established differences have been found in developmental trajectories for boys and girls for prosocial behavior and peer problems (Card et al, 2008 ; Chaplin and Aldao, 2013 ), as well as in both math and reading achievement (Robinson and Lubienski, 2011 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How Does Social Behavior Relate to Both Grades and Achievement Scores?

2018

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Prosocial behavior and peer problems are an important correlate of academic development; however, these effects vary by achievement measures and social behaviors. In this paper, we examined data from the German National Education Panel Study (NEPS), and we use structural equation modeling (SEM) to model the effects of prosocial behavior and peer problems on grades and competencies for both math (n = 3,310) and reading (n = 3,308) in grades 5 and 7. Our models account for the moderating effect of both gender and socioeconomic status (SES) as determined by parental education. We conclude that social behaviors relate to grades more strongly than competencies, that peer problems relate more strongly to achievement than prosocial behavior, and that the relationship is weaker in later grades. We discuss the implication that grades and achievement tests are not interchangeable measures for educators and researchers.

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“…Specifically, owing to disparities in resources and rank, heightened environmental threat, and lower personal control, poor consumers tend to be more other‐oriented (i.e., communal orientation). By contrast, wealthier consumers tend to be more self‐focused (i.e., agentic orientation), due to their greater control and freedom of choice, lower vulnerability to threats, and emphasis on individualism and personal accomplishment (Piff & Robinson, ; Piff et al., ). For example, compared with more affluent individuals, who can use material wealth to deal with difficulties, low‐income consumers depend more on their community to adapt to difficult environments (Stellar, Manzo, Kraus, & Keltner, ).…”

Section: Communal Orientation As a Psychological Consequence Of Povermentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving Financial Inclusion through Communal Financial Orientation: How Financial Service Providers Can Better Engage Consumers in Banking Deserts

et al. 2019

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Banking deserts, vulnerable communities that lack access to mainstream banks, represent a serious societal problem. Mainstream banks successfully entering banking deserts can help to assuage this problem. Drawing from research on the psychological consequences of poverty, we propose that mainstream banks can more successfully operate in banking deserts by increasing consumers' perception of communal financial orientation as a bank benefit (i.e., consumers' perception that engaging with the bank is beneficial for their community's well-being). Two field studies, comparing customers of a credit union who live in a banking desert and those who do not, show that the perception of communal financial orientation as a bank benefit increases bankingdesert consumers' beliefs that engaging with the credit union is beneficial and increases their likelihood of patronizing and recommending it; consumers living outside banking deserts do not display these effects. These findings provide novel insights into psychological mechanisms distinctly associated with banking-desert consumers and establish the importance of communal financial orientation. This is a win-win proposal for under-served communities and financial service providers because it helps both improve financial inclusion and increase the viability of serving banking deserts.

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Social class and prosocial behavior: current evidence, caveats, and questions

Cited by 112 publications

References 53 publications

No evidence that economic inequality moderates the effect of income on generosity

No evidence that economic inequality moderates the effect of income on generosity

How Does Social Behavior Relate to Both Grades and Achievement Scores?

Improving Financial Inclusion through Communal Financial Orientation: How Financial Service Providers Can Better Engage Consumers in Banking Deserts

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