The document explores the concept of altruism, discussing its theories and contrasting it with egoistic motivations in prosocial behavior. It covers aspects such as kin selection, empathy, and the behavioral and biological compatibility of altruistic acts, emphasizing the complexities in understanding pure altruism. The ongoing debates among psychologists and ecologists about the existence of purely altruistic behavior highlight the intricacies of motivations driving prosocial actions.

1. Altruism
BY Dr. SREEREMYA.S
FACULTY OF BIOLOGY

2. • Altruism is a theory which encapsulates the
social, behavioural, ecological, physiological
theories. Kin selection is an important aspect
of altruism. It’s considered much of a prosocial
behaviour. This paper embodies the altruistic
theories and its characteristics

3. • Social psychological theories often distinguish
between the altruistic and egoistic motivations for
prosocial behavior. Altruistic behavior is specifically
thought of as the type of prosocial behavior that is
motivated by the genuine desire to benefit another
person, without any expectation of benefits to one self.
Coming back to the above hypothetical scenario,
Charlie may be motivated to engage in merit bono
work out of compassion for disadvantaged clients who
particularly need his support.,

4. • There is ongoing debate among the psychologists over
whether purely altruistic behavior does in fact exist,
and most ecologist agree that prosocial behavior tends
to also be driven by egoistic (non-altruistic)
motivations. These can encompass a desire to feel
good about oneself, to improve one‟s social standing
(such as Charlie wanting to build the reputation at the
beginning of his career), or to avoid uncomfortable
feelings of sadness, anxiety, or guilt .Research seeking
to disentangle altruistic from the egoistic motivations
of prosocial behavior typically uses experimental
paradigms that manipulate aversive arousal

5. • EMPATHY An alternative approach to examining
antecedents of prosocial behavior is to describe the specific
skills that enable individuals to understand ramify social
situations and behave prosocially (Khalil et al., 1995b). This
aggrandized emotional empathy in today‟s cohort of older
adults, as compared to the young adults, may reflectolder
adults‟ desire to help others and engage in the emotionally
meaningful experiences or age-graded cultural
expectations to recognize and fulfill others‟ needs.
Emotional empathy is frequently assessment via
physiological arousal (skin conductance, heart rate),
nonverbal emotional cues (facial movements, gestures,
vocalizations), or self-reports of the empathy (Khalil 1995c).

6. • KIN SELECTION
• Unlike the psychological theories delineated above, evolutionary accounts of
prosocial behavior have focused on the survival benefits of prosocial behavior. For
example, kin selection theory holdsthat individuals are specifically motivated to
help members of their own family because this ultimately aids their own genes
survive. Linking this back to the altruism-egoism distinction, kin selections then
becomes, in a sense, both altruistic and egoistic (Khalil 1996b). It is altruistic to the
extent that an individual may the sacrifice his or her own well-being to help a
blood relative; at the same time, kin selection may also be seen as egoistic
because it garners to propagate one‟s own genes. Several researchers have
documented preferential helping for kin over unrelated individuals, even when this
contradicts social norms (Khalil 1996a). Behavioral compatibility
• For biological compatibility, selfishness translates into survival value; for behavioral
compatibility, selfishness translates into there in forcement (Khalil, 1997). From
the behavioral viewpoint, analtruistic act is not motivated, as an act of drinking is,
by the phase of an internal mechanism; it is rather a specific component that fits
into an overall pattern of behavior.

7. • To explain why the woman might risk her life to save
someone else‟s child, it would be a mistake to look for
current terrain or even future reinforcers of the act itself
(Khalil 1998). By definition, as analtruistic act, it is not
reinforced. In economic terms, adding up its costs and
benefits results in the negative value. Some behavioristic
analyses of altruism have tried to explain particular
altruistic acts in the terms of delayed rather than
immediate reinforcement (Khalil, 1999). But delayed rein
forcers, after being the discounted, may have significant
present value, even for nonhumans. If the present value of
the delayed reward is higher than the cost of the act, it is
hard to see how the act can be altruistic.

8. • These critics have merely replaced, as an explanatory device, the present action of
the delayed rewards with the present action of internal mechanisms (Khalil, 2000).
• According to the present view, a woman runs into the burning building to save
someone else‟s child (without the promise of money) not because she is
compelled to do so by some internal mechanism, nor because she has stopped to
calculate all the costs and benefits of this particular act; if she did stop to calculate
she would arrive at a negative answer and not do the act. Rather, this act forms
part of typical pattern of acts in her life, a pattern that is valuable in itself, apart
from the particular acts that composeit (Khalil, 2001). The pattern, as the pattern
of overt behavior, is worth so much to her that she would risk dying rather than
break it. Biological compatibility says that a specific altruistic act is itself of high
value by virtue of an inherited general altruistic mechanism (Khalil 2002). Learning
would enter into the development of the altruism, according to the biological
compatibility, only in the minimal sense that a baby has to learn how to eat
(Khalil2003a). The mechanism is there, the biologist says; you need only to learn
how to use it. Behavioral compatibility says, on other hand, that the altruistic act
itself is of low value and remains of low value. What is highly valued is the
temporally extended pattern of acts into which the particularact fits (Khalil 2003b).

9. • Journal of Nursing Practice, Management and
Education, Alturism, Dr.S.Sreeremya , 2019.Vol
1(1):1-11