Donations, Risk Attitudes and Time Preferences: A Study on Altruism in Primary School Children We study with a sample of 1,070 primary school children, aged seven to eleven years, how altruism in a donation experiment is related to children’s risk attitudes and intertemporal choices. Examining such a relationship is motivated by theories of reciprocal altruism that provide a cornerstone to unde...

Modeling intergenerational altruism is crucial to evaluate the long-term consequences of current decisions, and requires a set of principles guiding such altruism. We axiomatically develop a theory of pure, direct altruism: Altruism is pure if it concerns the total utility (rather than the mere consumption utility) of future generations, and direct if it directly incorporates the utility of all...

Evolutionary theory postulates that altruistic behavior evolved for the return-benefits it bears the performer. For return-benefits to play a motivational role, however, they need to be experienced by the organism. Motivational analyses should restrict themselves, therefore, to the altruistic impulse and its knowable consequences. Empathy is an ideal candidate mechanism to underlie so-called di...

Kin selection theory, also known as inclusive fitness theory, has been the subject of much debate and misunderstanding. Nevertheless, the idea that relatedness among individuals can drive the evolution of altruism has emerged as a central paradigm in evolutionary biology. Or has it? In two recent articles, E.O. Wilson argues that kin selection should no longer be considered the main explanation...

In "Altruism and the Origin of the Worker Caste," Bert Hölldobler and Edward Osborne Wilson explore the evolutionary origins of worker ants. "Altruism and the Origin of the Worker Caste" is the fourth chapter of Hölldobler and Wilson's book, The Ants, which was published by The Belknap Press of Harvard University [4] in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1990. In "Altruism and the Origin of the Worke...

This article addresses the question of the relevant conceptualization of «altruism» in Russian from the perspective sociological research operationalization. It investigates the spheres of social application of the word «altruism», include Russian equivalent «vzaimopomoshh`» (mutual help). The data for the study comes from Russian National Corpus (Russian). The theoretical framework consists of...

Philosophers, sociologists, psychologists and biologists have debated the existence of altruism in humans for years. Two predominant views across these fields explained altruistic behavior in terms of reinforcement or evolutionary genetics. Today, psychology still adheres to the notion that pure altruism cannot be demonstrated and is better explained through other egoistic models (e.g., reinfor...