Dispositional compassion shifts social preferences in systematic ways

Abstract

Introduction: How people attach value to the outcomes of self and other—social preferences—is central to social behavior. Recently, how dispositional and state emotion shape such social preferences has received researchers' attention.Method: The present investigation asked whether and to what extent dispositional and state compassion predict shifts in social preferences across 4 samples: two correlational samples (final ns 153 & 368, study 1a and 1b) and two experimental samples (final ns: 430 & 530, studies 2 and 3).Results: In keeping with recent accounts of compassion, dispositional compassion predicted general preference for equality, expressed as dispreference for both monetary advantage over another (interaction βs = −0.36, −0.33, −0.25, −0.22; all p < 0.001) and monetary disadvantage relative to others (βs: 0.26, 0.27, 0.28, 0.17; all p < 0.01; positive coefficients imply dispreference). This dispositional effect persisted when controlling for prosociality, positivity, agreeableness, and respectfulness. Furthermore, these dispositional compassion effects were relatively unchanged by experimental emotion inductions in studies 3 and 4. The experimental inductions of state compassion and state pride showed little evidence of systematic effects on social preferences relative to each other or a neutral condition.Discussion: Discussion focused on individual differences in emotion and social preferences.