While people are usually motivated by self-interest and gaining an advantage over others, this behavior is apparently changed when harm is added to the equation, according to a new study.
A team of researchers inquired on how people quickly learn to avoid harm to themselves and others. Their study, published in the journal JNeurosci, suggests that people make better choices geared toward the benefit of others.
Playing a Shock Game Under fMRI Scanning
Using a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner, 96 human male participants were tasked to play a game that introduces a stimulus in the form of an electrical shock. The participants in the study had to choose between two abstract symbols - both delivering electrical stimuli. One sends a non-painful electrical shock while the other sends a painful one.
The study found that through computational modeling, the participants were capable of making better choices when they were selecting for other participants instead of for themselves. Generally, participants in the study experienced less pain when deciding for another. Researchers suggest that the discrepancy can be attributed to an increased sensitivity to the value of one choice compared to the other.
Observing the fMRI scans showed that participants focused on avoiding the electrical shock exhibited increased activities in their ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC). This is the part of the brain believed to be involved in decision making, inhibiting response, and goal-appropriate response.
In choosing for another person, increased activity was also detected in the VMPFC, but in sync with the temporoparietal junction. In this area, the temporal and parietal lobes meet, involved in assessing information that leads to an understanding of another person's emotional state. The study suggests that other aspects of learning and making decisions are a result of both the neural valuation and social brain systems.
The Debate On Inherent Human Selfishness or Selflessness
The question of whether humans are inherently selfish or inherently selfless remains a topic of philosophical debate since the classical period. With the establishment of the scientific process, researchers have tried uncovering different aspects of this debate through observable and measurable means.
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Back in 2017, a report from Michael Dambrun of the Université Clermont Auvergne sought to empirically test whether selflessness and self-centeredness are distinct psychological constructs, instead of behavioral opposites on a single spectrum. It also examined the correlation of both behaviors with respect to happiness. To conduct the inquiry, 243 volunteers were enlisted from a single regional community in France, with the participants sufficiently heterogeneous in terms of age, gender, religion, education, and socio-economic status.
The study was able to establish that self-centeredness and selfishness were two distinct psychological constructs, owing to factor analysis drawn from different assessment tracks. Self-centeredness was evaluated through egocentrism and materialism, while selflessness was evaluated via self-transcendence and connectedness to others.
Furthermore, the second study from the report noted that self-centeredness was significantly associated with fluctuating short-term happiness. Meanwhile, selflessness has been related to authentic-durable happiness. Different processes also mediated these two psychological states. Afflictive affects mediated self-centeredness and fluctuating happiness, while selflessness and authentic-durable happiness were mediated by emotional stability and the feeling of harmony.
