Are Prosocials Unique in Their Egalitarianism? The Pursuit of Equality in Outcomes Among Individualists

26 Pages Posted: 15 Dec 2005

See all articles by Bram Van den Bergh

Bram Van den Bergh

KU Leuven - Faculty of Business and Economics (FEB)

Siegfried Dewitte

KU Leuven - Faculty of Business and Economics (FEB)

David De Cremer

Tilburg University

Date Written: August 2005

Abstract

The present research aims to elucidate to what extent the motive to ensure equality in outcomes is general and to what extent it interacts with other important motives such as maximizing own or collective gains. Because individuals may have different considerations and motivations in decision-making situations, it is likely that people with a different social value orientation will respond differently to an unequal distribution of outcomes. Contrary to our expectations, not only prosocials care about equality in outcomes. In study 1, we found that individualists choose to forego personal gains, despite obvious selfish reasons to cooperate, when outcomes were distributed unequally. In a second experiment we replicate this finding and show that individualists, just as do prosocials, demand equality in outcomes in interdependent situations. Our studies suggest that typifying individualists as solely being concerned about enhancing personal outcomes is too limited.

Keywords: Equality, Social Values, Tit-For-Tat, Cooperation

Suggested Citation

Van den Bergh, Bram and Dewitte, Siegfried and De Cremer, David, Are Prosocials Unique in Their Egalitarianism? The Pursuit of Equality in Outcomes Among Individualists (August 2005). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=870238 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.870238

Bram Van den Bergh (Contact Author)

KU Leuven - Faculty of Business and Economics (FEB) ( email )

Naamsestraat 69
Leuven, B-3000
Belgium

Siegfried Dewitte

KU Leuven - Faculty of Business and Economics (FEB) ( email )

Naamsestraat 69
Leuven, B-3000
Belgium

David De Cremer

Tilburg University ( email )

Postbus 90153
Tilburg, DC Noord-Brabant 5000 LE
Netherlands

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