Prosocial behaviour and theory of mind across lifespans and global socioeconomic situations

Prosocial behaviours - actions that help others - have the power to improve and even save the lives of others. Such behaviours are essential for healthy social interactions, with established impacts on life satisfaction, mental and physical health, and economic success (Hui, Ng, Berzaghi, Cunningham-Amos, & Kogan, 2020). However, the willingness to engage in prosocial behaviours profoundly changes across the lifespan and in different economic environments. Recent evidence suggests older adults might be more prosocial than younger adults on measures including charitable giving (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011) and effortful actions (Lockwood et al., 2020). In parallel, there is evidence that people in countries with higher economic wealth might donate more to charities (Bekkers & Wiepking, 2011), a common index of prosociality, but other studies suggest that in fact poorer people are more prosocial (Piff, Kraus, Côté, Cheng, & Keltner, 2010). However, participants in these studies are mostly from western, educated, industrialised, rich, and democratic populations (Henrich, Heine, & Norenzayan, 2010). Therefore, these patterns may not reflect the effects of ageing or income across the world. Other social-cognitive abilities that change with age may also explain changes in prosocial behaviour. Studies have suggested that 'theory of mind' (ToM) - understanding another person's thoughts and feelings could be different from one's own (Apperly, 2012) - could decline with age (Henry et al. 2013). However, how ToM ability relates to prosocial behaviour remains poorly understood.

Recent advances in data science and psychology have allowed the combination of measures of behaviour, computational models of decision-making and measures of self-report, which can get us closer to understanding why and how people behave prosocially and engage in ToM (Lockwood & Klein-Flugge, 2020; Ruff & Fehr, 2014). This project will be the first to draw upon these new advances and combine them with my previous industry experience in the charity sector (Oxfam) and extensive data analyses experience from my MSc in Psychology and MSc in Cognitive Neuroscience to examine the links between prosocial behaviour and ToM across the lifespan and across varying socio-economic conditions around the world. The findings of this project will have important implications for healthy development across the lifespan and lay the groundwork for strategies to increase prosocial behaviour and scaffold ToM abilities.