Collaborative Research: Signaling Prosociality: Harnessing Impure Motives to Help Others

合作研究：发出亲社会信号：利用不纯粹的动机帮助他人

• 批准号: 1529983
• 负责人: Alison Galvani
• 金额: $ 5.76万
• 依托单位: Yale University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-07-15 至 2018-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1529983&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Signaling; Prosociality; Harnessing

The question of how to facilitate pro-social behavior is one of the most pressing challenges facing behavioral scientists because answers to this question have far-reaching implications for a myriad causes of unhappiness. In many domains, such as vaccination, resource conservation, or blood donation, the outcome that is optimal for the group cannot be achieved unless individuals act beyond their narrow self-interest. The current research harnesses the principle of signaling to develop and test interventions that may inspire pro-social behavior by appealing to agents' desire to appear prosocial. Whereas some people may be motivated to contribute to the public good simply by altruistic concerns for others, even absent those purely altruistic motives, nearly everyone likes to be viewed by others as a prosocial person or to think of themselves as prosocial. In economic terms, this idea is captured by the concept of signaling -- engaging in a behavior that signals the type of person one is. Thus, a self-interested reason to engage in pro-social behavior is to signal (to oneself or to others) that one is a good person. Five sets of experiments in the current project test the idea that prosocial behavior can be increased if people are given the opportunity to use that behavior to signal their prosocial nature. In the proposed research the investigators test the effects of interventions designed based on signaling theory for their influence on prosocial behavior in a series of field and lab experiments. First, a field study in the context of a blood drive tests whether monetary incentives motivate blood donation more effectively when framed in a way that signals the pro-social motives of the decision maker to perform the behavior. Second, a study on framing messages to emphasize the signal value of vaccination examines whether parents of young children are more likely to receive an influenza vaccination for themselves after viewing a message presenting vaccination as a signal that one puts their children first than after seeing a message presenting vaccination as a signal that one puts self-care first, or after seeing either of two control messages. Third, in a study on peer recommendation, researchers will test whether a message advocating blood donation is more effective if it emphasizes the signal value of this behavior, and whether this signaling effect is more pronounced when the message comes in the form of a personalized recommendation from a co-worker as compared to a standard message from a blood drive. Fourth, three studies on social comparison will investigate whether feedback comparing one's performance to that of others promotes performance improvement in a pro-social task because the social comparison feedback serves as a signal, indicating what the performance says about the agent. Fifth, in a series of studies using a common pool resource game, researchers will explore the effect of a partitioning manipulation that signals the equitable amount for each agent to consume into order to achieve the group optimal outcome, and they will test whether the partition serves as a coordination signal. This research extends previous work in economics, social psychology, and decision research, and it applies signaling theory to the design of interventions to facilitate pro-social behavior. The body of research combines powerful field experiments with tightly controlled laboratory experimental designs to test the efficacy of signaling interventions by assessing actual behavior and examining the decision processes underlying these effects. The findings will simultaneously shed light on the nature of both pro-social behavior and signaling mechanisms.

如何促进亲社会行为的问题是行为科学家面临的最紧迫的挑战之一，因为对这个问题的答案对众多不幸的原因具有深远的影响。在许多领域，例如疫苗接种，资源保护或献血，除非个人在狭窄的自身利益范围内采取行动，否则对该群体最佳的结果无法实现。 当前的研究利用了信号传导的原则来开发和测试干预措施，这些干预措施可能通过吸引代理商渴望表现亲社会的愿望来激发亲社会行为。 尽管有些人可能只是通过对他人的利他问题来为公共利益做出贡献，即使没有那些纯粹的无私动机，几乎每个人都喜欢被别人看作是一个亲社会的人，或者将自己视为亲社会的亲社会。 从经济角度来看，这一想法是由信号传导的概念所捕获的，即一种信号的行为。因此，从事亲社会行为的自私理由是（向自己或他人）向一个人发出信号。 当前项目中的五组实验测试了一个想法，即如果有机会使用该行为来表明其亲社会性质，则可以增加亲社会行为。 在拟议的研究中，研究人员在一系列领域和实验室实验中测试了基于信号理论设计的干预措施对亲社会行为的影响。首先，在血液驱动测试背景下进行的现场研究是，货币激励措施是否以标志着决策者的亲社会动机的方式进行构图时，是否会更有效地捐赠血液捐赠。其次，一项关于框架消息的研究强调疫苗接种的信号价值，研究了幼儿父母在观看疫苗接种后的信息后，是否更有可能为自己接受流感疫苗接种，这是一种信号，表明人们将孩子放在首位，而不是在看到一条消息后将其放在首位将疫苗接种作为一种信号，表明人们将自我保健放在首位，或者在看到两个控制消息之一之后。第三，在一项关于同伴建议的研究中，研究人员将测试如果强调这种行为的信号价值，以及当消息以个性化建议的形式出现时，提倡献血的消息是否更有效，以及该信号效应是否更为明显。与来自血液驱动器的标准消息相比，同事。第四，有关社会比较的三项研究将调查将反馈比较一个人的绩效与他人的绩效提高绩效的改善，因为社会比较反馈是一个信号，表明绩效对代理人说了什么。第五，在使用共同池资源游戏的一系列研究中，研究人员将探索分区操作的效果，该操作的效果标志着每个代理商的公平量，以使每个代理商取得均取得最佳结果，他们将测试该分区是否服务作为协调信号。这项研究扩展了以前的经济学，社会心理学和决策研究，并将信号理论应用于干预措施的设计以促进亲社会行为。研究主体将强大的现场实验与严格控制的实验室实验设计结合在一起，通过评估实际行为并检查这些效果的决策过程，以测试信号干预措施的功效。这些发现将同时阐明亲社会行为和信号传导机制的性质。