Observations Of Prosocial Behavior

680 Words2 Pages

Abe Baker
Professor Zengel
2016-04-03
PSYC 372
Observations of Prosocial Behavior in Everyday Life Many human behaviors can be explained using evolutionary logic. For example, people often make social connections to improve their chances of getting a job, and people put considerable effort into dating to find a high-quality mate. Both of these behaviors help increase one's biological fitness, or ability to pass on one's genes to offspring. However, some behaviors seem harder to explain in terms of seeking increased fitness, such as prosocial behaviors benefitting people who may not be related to you. Prosocial behaviors still fit into an evolutionary view of social psychology because they often benefit the benefactor as well as the aid recipient. This week, I monitored my actions to identify prosocial behaviors and label what goals drove me to do them, including improving my basic welfare, managing my emotions, and gaining social status. …show more content…

This week, I noticed that door holding behavior is often rewarded by others holding doors open for you in return. One day, as my sister and I headed to breakfast at Neptune, I held the door open for her since I was a few steps ahead of her. After breakfast, my sister got to the door faster than I did, and she held the door open for me. This exchange of prosocial behaviors illustrates the goal of improving one's basic welfare: although I was not aware of it at the time, a major reason I held the door open was because I expected that she would later hold the door for me as

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