Better world: Be nice to people

An article from : 19 September 2009 by Michael Bond

It sounds kind of obvious, and a little trite: the world would be a better place to live in if we were all a bit kinder to each other. But how can we make that happen?

This is fast becoming a valid scientific question. Psychologists and neuroscientists are exploring how to increase people's capacity for empathy and compassion, with two ongoing studies claiming that meditation not only increases compassionate feelings but also improves physical and emotional health.

But you don't have to be a Buddhist monk or an expert on brain plasticity to help increase global compassion. There is evidence that altruistic acts spread through social networks. In other words, if you are kind to a friend, they are more likely to be kind to someone else they know.

To demonstrate this, Nicholas Christakis of Harvard Medical School in Boston designed a cooperation game in which 120 students were organised into groups of four and asked to give money to their group. The game lasted five rounds, and after each round the students were reorganised so that no two appeared in the same group twice. The researchers told the participants at the end of each round how much the others in their group had given.

They found that generosity is infectious. If someone gave a dollar more than the predicted group average, the others in that group gave approximately 20 cents more than expected in the next round. This altruism persisted into the third round.

Christakis's team found in a separate study that cooperative behaviour spreads to three degrees of separation - from friend to friend to friend. So if you are popular and well connected, you could have a special role to play: your compassionate acts could resonate further through the network, and you are also more likely to benefit from other people's kindness.

Be aware of the impact you have on people who are in touch with you on these social networks. Of course, you can positively influence many people, but the opposite is also true. Be aware that you are now a person likely to influence many more people than you think. Are you aware?