Paulus Markus, Moore Chris
Department of Developmental Psychology, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Germany.
Department of Psychology, Dalhousie University, Canada.
Dev Sci. 2017 May;20(3). doi: 10.1111/desc.12417. Epub 2016 Jun 2.
Research has demonstrated that sharing with others is rewarding, suggesting a proximal mechanism of humans' extraordinary tendency to engage in prosocial behavior. The current study explored the cognitive basis of the relation between generosity and happiness early in ontogeny. We demonstrate that preschool children understand the relation between generosity and happiness. Moreover, our results show that children's emotion ratings are predictive for their subsequent sharing behavior. This finding provides evidence for the theoretical claim that prosocial behavior may be related to the anticipation of positive feelings, and that this mechanism may explain early instances of generosity in preschool children.
研究表明，与他人分享是有益的，这表明了人类参与亲社会行为的非凡倾向的一种近端机制。当前的研究探讨了个体发育早期慷慨与幸福之间关系的认知基础。我们证明学龄前儿童理解慷慨与幸福之间的关系。此外，我们的结果表明，儿童的情绪评分可预测他们随后的分享行为。这一发现为亲社会行为可能与对积极情绪的预期有关这一理论主张提供了证据，并且这种机制可能解释了学龄前儿童早期的慷慨行为实例。
