The Effect Of Social Identity And Responsibility Situation On Responsibility And Prosocial Behayior In Social Dilemma

Responsibility is a core concept to understand how people make judgments and behave in specific context and is of significance for the development of society. Therefore, the research on responsibility attracts more and more attention in the area of sociology, ethics, education and political science. Responsibility has not been studied thoroughly in psychology. Prior research mainly focused on the relative static side of responsibility; while there is no systematic research on both the static and dynamic factors that influence responsibility. From a social-cognitive perspective, this paper explored the interactive influence of social identity and situational factors on responsibility and pro-social behavior. There are two studies involved. Study1examined the influence of social identity (economic condition) and the behaviors of others (cooperative or non-cooperative) on responsibility and pro-social behavior in the non-economic goal. Results showed that social identity had a main effect on responsibility and pro-social behavior:participants had a higher level of responsibility and contributed more when they were in equal economics status conditions than when they were in the lower economic status conditions. The behavior of others had no significant impact on responsibility, but people contributed more when others were non-cooperative than when others were cooperative. At the same time, responsibility and pro-social behavior were significantly correlated. Study2discussed the impact of social identity (moral identity centrality), prime, the behavior of others (cooperative or non-cooperative) on responsibility and pro-social behavior in the non-economic and economic goals. Results showed that (1) participants for whom moral identity had higher centrality exhibited higher levels of responsibility and pro-social behavior than lower centrality participants;(2) participants in cooperative condition showed higher levels of responsibility and pro-social behavior than in non-cooperative condition;(3) the centrality of moral identity and prime had a significant interactive effect on responsibility in two goals;(4)the centrality of moral identity and the behavior of others had a significant interactive effect on responsibility only in economic goal;(5) participants exhibited higher levels of responsibility and pro-social behavior in non-economic goal than in economic goal;(6) responsibility and pro-social behavior were significantly correlated; personal and situational factors have similar influence on responsibility and pro-social behavior. The results showed the complexity of influential factors on responsibility and pro-social behaviors, which demonstrated the importance of social cognitive theory. Finally, based on the results, this paper discussed the limitations and future research possibilities.