Transgression and altruism: A case for hedonism

A model to account for the positive relationship between transgression and altruism was proposed and tested against three alternative formulations—Guilt, Social Justice, and Self-esteem Bolstering. The proposed model, Negative State Relief, asserts that people in a transgression situation behave charitably in order to reduce a general, negative affective state which is induced by exposure to harm-doing and that if the negative state is relieved by some other means, benevolent activity will be rendered unnecessary. All of the experimental subjects were exposed to an act of transgression; half performed the act themselves while half only witnessed it. In one set of experimental conditions (the relief conditions), a positive event—the receipt of either money or approval—was interposed between the harmful act and a fellow-student's request for aid. In another set of experimental conditions (the norelief conditions), no such positive event occurred. It was found, as predicted, that subjects who received a positive event were significantly less helpful than those who did not, but were not different from a control group which had never been exposed to the transgression. It was also found that harm-doers and harm-witnesses were identical in benevolent tendency. The results were interpreted as favoring a hedonistic conception of the nature of altruism. Finally, it was contended that a U-shaped relationship exists between mood state and helping tendency.