: A Fact and a Narrative of Norwegian Prosocial Behavior.

Evolved mechanisms of phenotypic plasticity, which are evolutionary processes in their own right, enable species to respond adaptively to their environments. The Scandinavian countries, and Norway in particular, have for many years scored exceptionally high on lists of life quality, economic indicators, and measures of happiness. We propose that learning prosocial and cooperative behavior, which is central in a particular Norwegian cultural practice, , plays a role in the country's success story. is a Norwegian term for a type of voluntary work carried out as a community or collective and traditionally involving a social gathering. has a long history in Norway, and it is a well-established cultural practice that has led to and still maintains significant social benefits. is arranged in virtually all communities such as kindergartens, neighborhoods, schools, and organizations. Participation in gatherings is generally expected. Children from a young age are involved in . activities are based on cooperation and can include anything from arranging a spring cleaning in the local community to building a club house for your children's sports club. This paper discusses as a cultural practice that creates an environment that nurtures prosocial and cooperative activities. From a behavior analytic, selectionist perspective, we propose a non-domain-specific learning mechanism for -typical prosocial and cooperative behavior analogous to the phylogenetic evolutionary mechanism of group selection. Contingencies can lead to and maintain activities when extended behavioral patterns are selected as wholes.