Reed Lawrence Ian, Matari Yanal, Wu Molly, Janaswamy Revathi
1 Department of Psychology, New York University, NY, USA.
2 Department of Psychiatry, McLean Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
Evol Psychol. 2019 Jul-Sep;17(3):1474704919872421. doi: 10.1177/1474704919872421.
How do our emotional tears affect the way we are treated? We tested whether tears, paired with either a neutral or a sad facial expression, elicited prosocial behavior among perceivers. Participants viewed a video clip depicting a confederate partner with or without tears displaying either a neutral or sad facial expression before making a behavioral decision in one of two economic games. In a Trust game (Experiment 1), participants who played the role of the investor were more likely to share an endowment after viewing a confederate trustee with tears (paired with either a neutral or a sad facial expression) in comparison to a confederate trustee without tears. However, in a Dictator game (Experiment 2), participants who played the role of allocator were no more likely to share an endowment after viewing a confederate recipient with tears (paired with either a neutral or sad facial expression) in comparison to a confederate recipient without tears. Taken together, these findings suggest that tears increase prosocial behavior by increasing trustworthiness as opposed to generally increasing other-regarding altruistic tendencies.
我们饱含情感的泪水如何影响他人对待我们的方式？我们进行了测试，观察伴随中性或悲伤面部表情的泪水是否会引发观察者的亲社会行为。参与者观看一段视频片段，其中一名同盟伙伴有或没有流泪，呈现中性或悲伤的面部表情，然后在两个经济游戏之一中做出行为决策。在信任游戏（实验1）中，与没有流泪的同盟受托人相比，扮演投资者角色的参与者在看到流泪的同盟受托人（伴随中性或悲伤面部表情）后，更有可能分享捐赠资金。然而，在独裁者游戏（实验2）中，与没有流泪的同盟接受者相比，扮演分配者角色的参与者在看到流泪的同盟接受者（伴随中性或悲伤面部表情）后，并没有更倾向于分享捐赠资金。综合来看，这些发现表明，泪水通过增加可信度来促进亲社会行为，而不是普遍增强关心他人的利他倾向。
