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The modern world encourages self-interest rather than responsibility of…

- - - - At their core, people go to work due to self-interest. A baker for instance, has to earn enough money to live and the most effective way he has found is bread baking. In fact, the bread has to be good enough quality to be sold as a valuable good. Self-interest therefore, stimulates a behavior which is beneficial for others and the person themselves.
  - - - Complexities arise when we attend closely to the mechanisms by which people experience the emotions of others. Batson (1995) has alternatively proposed the ‘empathic-altruism’ (p. 363) hypothesis that altruism sometimes results from an ability to internalize other people’s emotions and thereby share their concerns. Empathic individuals experience and care about the predicament of others. They are thereby predisposed to address the underlying problem. Consequently, the over-arching goal is not self-interested, as the term has been deﬁned thus far.
      - example
        
        Much evidence shows that helping behavior is sometimes motivated by empathy. In a series of experimental studies reviewed by Batson (1995), for example, researchers induced some participants to experience empathy for an allegedly harmed co-worker. Despite a readily available means of leaving the situation, individuals with empathic feelings were likely to render assistance even when so doing was personally troublesome (e.g., exposing themselves to painful electric shocks). Interestingly, those experiencing only generalized distress, but who were not empathic, tended to take the most efﬁcient route to mood enhancement. They were helpful if necessary but choose to escape when given an opportunity. These studies thus replicated the classic mood maintenance effect only for general dis-tress. In contrast, the empathy effect strongly implies behavior motivated by factors other than self-interest, because it involves behavior motivated primarily by the interests of another person even when helping is potentially costly and when one could easily escape the unpleasant situation.
      - Mood maintenance is seen as an important factor to be more productive in our everyday activities and works, thus it is in our best interest to stay happy all the time. Mood maintenance provides an intriguing approach to self-interest. Witnessing another person’s suffering causes observers to experience negative affect. This unpleasantness motivates them to reduce their distress. Thus a mood maintenance model might implicate self-interest by the putative ‘altruist’ to restore pleasant feelings, and evidence indicates that individuals do indeed render assistance in order to regulate their moods.
  - - - Fairness is an instrumental goal that people implement as a
        means of achieving positive interpersonal relationships for themselves and these relationships are important in the modern world, they help us fight loneliness and also gives us a sense of purpose in life, or in other words, for our psychological well-being. Hence, we deﬁne fairness as self-interest.
        
        We need to know if individuals formulating an urge to punish did so by considering which goal-options might best reﬂect their self-interests.
        
        The form of self-interest they consider, however, would pertain (if true) only to punishment decisions made after participants had already deemed unfairness wrong.
        
        To evoke self-interest in this case would be to ignore the circularity of relying on an analysis of goal pursuit that stipulates self-interest as part of the very deﬁnition of goal-pursuit itself. Thus, our analysis requires distinguishing between (a) the punishers’ choice of retaliation because they wanted to punish(a means of satisfying their interest in punishing, by deﬁnition), and (b) the prior unfairness-aversion that steered their choice in that particular direction (not addressed by Colquitt & Greenberg’s, 2001,model). Acting from guilt-avoidance or self-esteem maintenance implies that punishers must ﬁrst have had some basis for treating the non-punishment option as something whose choice might make them feel guilty or might have esteem-threatening implications
        
        equality is the core of fairness. the human motive of "self-interest" may result in conflicts that need to be mediated. Though appeasement of conflicts is possible by authoritative decision making, where procedural justice is crucial, conflict mediation by both sides is generally a more preferable procedure. The mediation strategy must facilitate an agreement, which is just and productive for all who are involved or affected.
        
        For example, Kahneman et al. (1986) present evidence indicating that individuals willingly sacriﬁced money to punish an act of intended unfairness (and to reward a prior act of intended fairness). In a series of four experimental studies, Turillo, Folger, Lavelle,Umphress, and Gee (2002) extended these ideas. Their ﬁrst three studies indicated that participants were willing to sacriﬁce their ﬁnancial self-interest in reaction to unfairness, even when there were no material or symbolic beneﬁts (e.g., reputation-related) for doing this. Taken together, these studies ruled out the possibility of monetary payoffs (because participants had to pay to punish the wrong-doer), deterrence (because the transgressor did not know he or she was being punished), and group afﬁliation (because they did not know either the perpetrator or victim). Based on these considerations,Kahneman et al. and Turillo et al. maintained that individuals are motivated to act based upon an internalized sense of duty to uphold moral norms.
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        Because of many issues related to harming forests and animals for production of goods, with lots of publications and public awareness about these things in social medias, many businessmen see this as an opportunity to attract customers, targeting those environmentalists and animal lovers by including those eco-friendly and no harming innocent animal signs, thus establishing a positive brand image that may increase profits.
- - - - Eighteen percent of participants asserted that social location (e.g., wealth, marginalization) motivates altruism. These individuals noted that wealth, poverty, and experiences with various forms of discrimination inform peoples' ability to appreciate what is truly valuable in life, and their ability to learn how to care for and give to others. Alicena, for example, stated:
        
        [Y]ou know, you got some people who's got prestige and they are in a position to do things for other people and they won't… But, you got people that have nothing that's willing to give… you know, a kind word… I guess because we know, the poor know what a struggle is. You know. Some people born rich with a silver spoon in their mouth, they have everything, but really they have nothin'.
        
        Alicena highlights the point that social class influences altruism in ways that are sometimes counterintuitive.
    - - This woman I did not even know and who did not even know me, she took the time to do this good thing. And I learned from that. I learned what we should be like with each other.
      - Jeannine explained that her own penchant for altruism was influenced by an encounter in which she and her three children were fed and cared for by a stranger whom she met in a subway station on the day that she and her children fled from her violent husband. Jeannine stated:
      - Ms. Eva's actions influenced Jude's belief that selfless acts of giving create community, and shaped his commitment to behave in ways that would construct community.
      - Miss Eva took care of me on the street… I could knock on Miss Eva's door and I could say, ‘Miss Eva, I'm hungry.’… That's community. Neighborhood is ‘I got mine, you go get yours’…. Somebody's killing somebody in the hallway, I lock my door…- that's neighborhood nonsense. Community is something different. Community is caring…
      - Fifty-one percent of participants attributed altruism, in part, to having witnessed, or having been the recipients of, the altruism of individuals outside of the family (e.g., strangers, historical figures). Non-familial models of altruism appeared to cultivate a psychological sense of community. That is, direct and indirect encounters with strangers and neighbors who engaged in mundane or extraordinary acts of care created or reified a view of community as a place in which the fates of all community members are linked inextricably, and in which people have a responsibility to care for and respond to the needs of others. For example, Jude, who works in the community, linked his own altruism to his childhood experience with a neighbor. He stated:
  - - - Religious doctrine and faith were identified by 49% of participants as factors that motivated selfless behaviors. Some participants cited passages from particular sacred texts (e.g., the Bible) that they believe reflect the importance of selfless giving. Darryl, stated, for example:
        
        Everything what I do for a person— … started from a Christian—it is from the heart. I would not do— it's never, `what could I, what could I get?' … God taught us to be gentle, right? To be kind… [T]here's a part of the Bible that stated…He told them, “When I was hungry you did not give me anything to eat. When I was thirsty you did not give me nothing to drink.” …And they said, “Lord, we have never seen you before.”… He said, ‘Yes, you have. You have seen me everyday.’ So when I deal with people I don't know exactly who I am running into. I don't know if I am running into Him.
        
        One might conjecture that Darryl's behavior reflects not altruism, but a desire to gain favor with God in order to ensure a place in Heaven. However, at no point in his interview did Darryl assert that it was important to help others because doing so would ensure salvation. Importantly, the fact that Darryl did not point to his good deeds as a vehicle for earning salvation or divine favor is consistent with the Christian belief that individuals are saved by divine grace and not by their own deeds. Darryl's actions and the Biblical passage that he cites appear to reflect a belief that a way of honoring God's command to be good to each other is to see the divinity in each person we meet (i.e., to remember that we don't know if we are “running into Him”).
        
        Altruism was seen by 13% of participants as a calling or life purpose. Charles, who mentors children noted: “I really believe that that is one of my missions…some people believe that you are born with it, but I think to a certain extent you are born with a mission.”
  - - - All my life I wanted to be like my mom. … She was a mother of communities of different people. Different cultures, different races. And, I have to say she was a doctor. She was a healer… She would just touch people and, as I was growing up, I knew I wanted to be like her… She has influenced me to do what I do in every possible way.
        
        Family stories of altruism were laden with a sense of gratitude, pride and awe, and seemed to serve at least two functions. First, they served as repositories of information about the specific ways in which family members helped to transform the lives of others. For example, participants recalled details regarding family members' efforts to provide resources (e.g., food, money) and solace to others. Second, these stories defined participants as a part of a legacy of care that helped to shape their identity, their choice of profession, and/or their commitment to treating people with care. In sum, these stories answered the questions: “who am I?” “what is expected of me?” and “how do I want to live?” Angelina, for example, talked about how her mother's extraordinary acts of giving influenced her own professional choices (she is a social activist) and her lifelong commitment to caring for others. She stated:
        
        Sixty-two percent of participants attributed their altruism to the influence of family models (e.g., grandparents or fictive kin3) of altruism and kindness. Participants almost invariably had defining stories about having witnessed or having been the recipients of family altruism; many recalled direct or indirect familial exhortations regarding the importance of caring for others. What defined these motives as modeling was the deliberate effort of the actor to serve as an example for others (e.g., to teach others how to give), or the decision made by witnesses to or recipients of altruism to emulate the behavior of the altruist. From family members these participants learned how to identify the needs of others, how to respond to those needs, and to privilege care for the well-being of others over the pursuit of personal wants and needs. Importantly, the regularity with which family members cared for others helped to normalize the ethos of care.