Psychology 2070A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Reciprocal Altruism, Robert Sapolsky, Prosocial Behavior

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 2070A/B
• Professor: Erin Herrey

Document Summary

[recall]: the best strategy in the prisoner"s dilemma is to defect, but that is not what people actually do: people help other"s because it feels good, being helps also feels good. What is prosocial behavior: prosocial behavior = refers to any behavior performed with the goal of benefiting another person. Pros & cons of helping: benefits of helping, feel good, avoid punishment, gain social approval, decrease distress felt when seeing someone in need, reciprocation of help. If you help someone, they might return the favor: costs of helping, physical danger, pain, embarrassment, time consuming, monetary loss. If natural selection favors behaviors that promote survival, why are people and animals altruistic: potentially explained by, kin selection, reciprocal altruism, ability to learn social norms, altruism happens across the animal kingdom. [what is no longer unique]: tit for tat reciprocity. [uniquely human]: no other species can deal fact that others have different desires than our own.