{"id":11,"date":"2011-03-22T10:57:27","date_gmt":"2011-03-22T10:57:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/?p=11"},"modified":"2011-03-22T10:57:27","modified_gmt":"2011-03-22T10:57:27","slug":"thinking-of-a-happy-childhood-%e2%80%93-some-potential-unexpected-benefits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/2011\/03\/thinking-of-a-happy-childhood-%e2%80%93-some-potential-unexpected-benefits\/","title":{"rendered":"Thinking of a happy childhood \u00e2\u20ac\u201c some potential unexpected benefits"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Could simply recalling happy childhood memories make us more likely to act ethically and helpfully? <a href=\"http:\/\/hbswk.hbs.edu\/item\/6633.html?wknews=03142011\">Quite possibly yes, judging by a working paper* released last week<\/a>. To quote Harvard Working Knowledge\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s executive summary:<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<ul>\n<li>Through four experiments, the researchers show that triggering childhood memories induces feelings of moral purity in adults, which leads them to behave pro-socially\u00e2\u20ac\u201dthat is, to do kind, ethical things that benefit others.<\/li>\n<li>Recalling childhood memories also can lead adults to judge (and punish) unethical behavior more harshly than they would have otherwise.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>What were these \u00e2\u20ac\u0153kind, ethical things\u00e2\u20ac\u009d? Per the abstract:<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>In Experiment 1, participants instructed to recall memories from their childhood were more likely to help the experimenter with a supplementary task than were participants in a control condition, and this effect was mediated by self-reported feelings of moral purity. In Experiment 2, the same manipulation increased the amount of money participants donated to a good cause, and self-reported feelings of moral purity mediated this relationship. In Experiment 3, participants who recalled childhood memories judged the ethically-questionable behavior of others more harshly, suggesting that childhood memories lead to altruistic punishment. Finally, in Experiment 4, compared to a control condition, both positively-valenced and negatively-valenced childhood memories led to higher empathic concern for a person in need, which, in turn increased intentions to help.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Almost as interesting was some of the earlier research cited by the study:<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Similarly, Aarts and Dijksterhuis (2003) showed that people automatically lowered their voice when they were shown a picture of a library, indicating that merely seeing the photo activated situational norms that one should not speak loudly in a library.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>You can check out <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hbs.edu\/research\/pdf\/11-079.pdf\">the full text of the working paper here<\/a>. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m usually interested by research as to what makes us think and act the way we do (perhaps this is why behavioural finance fascinates me?), and this was no exception.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>* \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Memory Lane and Morality: How Childhood Memories Promote Prosocial Behavior\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, by Francesca Gino of Harvard Business School, and Sreedhari D. Desai of Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Could simply recalling happy childhood memories make us more likely to act ethically and helpfully? Quite possibly yes, judging by a working paper* released last week. To quote Harvard Working Knowledge\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s executive summary: &nbsp; Through four experiments, the researchers show &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/2011\/03\/thinking-of-a-happy-childhood-%e2%80%93-some-potential-unexpected-benefits\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-behaviour"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.petersahui.com\/optimist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}