Empathy: A clue for prosocialty and driver of indirect reciprocity

Indirect reciprocity has been proposed to explain prosocial behavior among strangers, whereby the prosocial act is returned by a third party. However, what happens if the prosocial act cannot be observed by the third party? Here, we examine whether empathy serves as a clue for prosociality and wheth...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2021-08, Vol.16 (8), p.e0255071-e0255071
Main Authors: von Bieberstein, Frauke, Essl, Andrea, Friedrich, Kathrin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Aged
Altruism
Biology and Life Sciences
Dictators
Emotions
Empathy
Female
Games
Helping behavior
Human resource management
Humans
Hypotheses
Laboratories
Male
Middle Aged
Physical Sciences
Psychological aspects
Psychological research
Reciprocity
Regression Analysis
Reputations
Research and Analysis Methods
Social aspects
Social Sciences
Society
Third party
Young Adult
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Summary:Indirect reciprocity has been proposed to explain prosocial behavior among strangers, whereby the prosocial act is returned by a third party. However, what happens if the prosocial act cannot be observed by the third party? Here, we examine whether empathy serves as a clue for prosociality and whether people are more generous toward more empathetic people. In a laboratory study, we measured prosocial behavior as the amount sent in the dictator game and empathy based on the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI). By using an incentivized task, we find that people believe that more empathetic participants send more money in the dictator game. Thus, people see empathy as a clue for prosocial behavior. Furthermore, in a second dictator game, participants indirectly reciprocate by sending more money to more empathetic recipients. Therefore, we suggest that empathy can replace a reputation derived from observable prosocial behavior in triggering indirect reciprocity.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0255071