CITIZENSHIP

FINAL PROJECT PAPER

By Fitto Priestaza PR 2010 009201000063

ALTRUISM
Altruism is a concern for the welfare of others without regard for our self. This behavior is a virtue that contain in many cultures and is considered important by some religions. Altruism can be distinguished by feelings of loyalty and obligation. Altruism focuses on a motivation to help others and a desire to do something good without expect any reward. This concept has been popular in the history, especially in philosophical thought and ethics, and recently became a topic in psychology, sociology, and biology. This concept from any field can give positive effect to other areas, but the method and the center of attention of these fields stated above could generates different perspectives on altruism.

Definition of Altruism
The word Altruism first appeared in the 19th century by the sociologist named Auguste Comte. The word itself came from Greek word Alteri which means other person. According to Comte, a person has a moral responsibility to serve humanity completely. Thus, Altruism explains about the attention of any people that is not selfish to the needs of other person. So, there are three components within altruism, the first is loving others, helping them doing their time of need, dan making sure that they are appreciated. According to Baston (2002), altruism is the response that leads to positive feeling, such as empathy. Altruist has altruistic motivation, the desire to always helping others. Altruistic motivation shown because, there are internal reasons inside him/her that can lead to show of positive feeling that can come up with any action to help others.

Motivation of Altruism
According to Myers (1996) altruism is one of pro social actions with the reason of the welfare of others without any concern of the reward. There are 3 theories that can explain about motivation of a person to do altruism: 1. Social - exchange In this theory, the act of helping can be explained by the existence of social exchange reward. Altruism describes that the rewards that motivate the inner-reward (distress). For example is the satisfaction of helping or circumstances that make it difficult (guilt) for help. 2. Social Norms The reasons to help others is because it is based on "something" that tells us to "must" help. The "Something" itself is a social norm. In altruism, social norms can be explained by the existence of social responsibility. The existence of social responsibility can cause a person to take action to help as needed and without expecting rewards in the future. 3. Evolutionary Psychology In this theory, explained that the essence of life is to maintain the generation. Altruistic behavior can arise easily if the other people who will get help is the same or similar person (same characteristic). For example, someone who help other people that are identical to him/her family, neighbors, and so on.

From the explanation above, Myers (1996) concluded altruism will easily occur in the presence of: 1. Social Responsibility, a person feels socially responsible with what goes around him/her. 2. Distress - inner reward, personal satisfaction without any external factors. 3. Kin Selection, there is one characteristic of the victims that are identical.

Characteristics of altruism
In addition to the explanation above, Myer (1996) describes the characteristics of the behavior of altruism: 1. Empathy Altruism will occur in the presence of empathy inside a person. The most altruistic person feel themselves responsible, have a social characteristic, always adapt, tolerant, able to control themselves, and motivated to make a good impression. 2. Belief on a just world Characteristic behavior of altruist is the belief in "a just world", they believe that the world is a good place and can be predicted that the good always get the "gift" and the poor get a "punishment". With that believe, a person can easily show the behavior of the premises to help (which can be categorized as "Good"). 3. Social responsibility Each person is responsible for everything done by others, so when there is someone who needs help, that person must help him/her. 4. Internal LOC The next characteristic of altruist is they can control themself internally. Various things he/she does are motivated by internal controls, for example is self-satisfaction. 5. Low egocentrism An altruist has low self-egoism. He/she was concerned with other interests first than the interests of himself/herself.

Altruism Behavior Indicators

Altruism behavior indicator is as the following: 1. Empathy: an altruist felt the same according to the situation. 2. Interpretation: an altruist can interpret and realize that a situation need of help. 3. Social responsibility: an altruist feels responsible to the situation around him/her. 4. Initiative: an altruist has the initiative to help quickly and precisely. 5. Willing to sacrifice: an altruist ready to sacrifice something form himself/herself to take action to help.

Factors That Influence Altruism

There are several factors that influence a person to provide help to others: 1. Mood If the mood is good, people will also be encouraged to provide more help. It's nice to feel the atmosphere that people tend to extend it with a positive attitude. Research shows that helping others would be preferable if the reward is clear. The more tangible the rewards, the more willing people to help (Forgas & Bower). 2. Empathy Helping others makes us feels good; with empathy we can help others without pushed by selfish motivation. That is the empathy itself that motivate a person to do altruistic act. 3. Believe the Justice World Another factor that motivates altruism is the belief that there is justice in the world, which in the long term of time the wrong will be punished and the good will be rewarded. According to Melvin Lerners theory, a person who believes to the justice world will be motivated to try to fix

the condition when they see innocent people suffer. So without take a long time to think, they will immediately give any help if there are people who need. 4. Socio-biological factors Altruistic behavior suggests counterproductive, high risk including injured and even die. When helped people could survive, the people who help probably may not survive. Such behavior can arise because there are a process of adaptation to the closer neighborhood, in this case the parents. In addition, although minimal, there is also the role of genetic contribution. 5. Situational factors. Studies ever showed that in giving help, there was no difference between criminal and not. Then, it was concluded that situational factors have promoted someone to give help to others.