The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment

Fabian Kosse, Thomas Deckers, Pia Pinger, Hannah Schildberg-Hoerisch () and Armin Falk

Munich Reprints in Economics from University of Munich, Department of Economics

Abstract: This study presents evidence on the role of social environment for the formation of prosociality. We show that socioeconomic status (SES) as well as intensity of mother-child interaction and mothers' prosocial attitudes are related to elementary school children's prosociality. We also present evidence on a randomly assigned variation of the social environment, providing children with a mentor for 1 year. Our data reveal a significant and persistent increase in prosociality in the treatment relative to the control group. Moreover, enriching the social environment closes the prosociality gap between low- and high-SES children. A mediation analysis suggests that prosociality develops in response to prosocial role models and intense social interactions.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (168)

Published in Journal of Political Economy 2 128(2020): pp. 434-467

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
Journal Article: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2020)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2019)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2018)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2018)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2018)
Working Paper: The formation of prosociality: Causal evidence on the role of social environment (2017)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2016)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2016)
Working Paper: The Formation of Prosociality: Causal Evidence on the Role of Social Environment (2016)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:lmu:muenar:84772

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Munich Reprints in Economics from University of Munich, Department of Economics Ludwigstr. 28, 80539 Munich, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Tamilla Benkelberg ().