LAUSR

Some of the most persistent questions about prosocial behavior have addressed whether people act on behalf of others out of a genuine concern for their welfare, or whether people are rather driven by hidden selfish strategizing and external societal demands to do something they would not do otherwise [1]. Disentangling the various motivators of prosocial behavior and their interplay of these factors is tricky. It is particularly challenging when studying adults who have gone through a long period of learning and internalization of social expectations — and who further possess sophisticated cognitive skills allowing them to reason how others think about them to adjust their behavior accordingly. The study of prosocial behavior over development can therefore play a unique role in untangling foundational aspects of human psychology. Developmental research can identify the earliest states of prosocial behavior in ontogeny, and then trace the changes that occur over developmental time. By doing so, it can probe how external factors and underlying mechanisms shape prosocial behavior from childhood through adolescence into adulthood.