Recently, the relationship between reputation and altruism has gained significant attention. The present study examined whether the relationship between rejection avoidance and altruism differs according to social norms. A total of 320 participants completed an online survey with questions concerning rejection avoidance and altruism in situations where either a prosocial or non-prosocial norm was present. As predicted, people with higher levels of rejection avoidance displayed less altruism only in the context of non-prosocial norms. This result corresponds with previous evidence that suggests that altruism can be evaluated negatively by others when it deviates from social norms. These findings shed a new light on the relationship between reputation and altruism.

Introduction

Individuals sometimes display altruism, which is the tendency to act on behalf of others, even at one’s own expense (Fehr & Fischbacher, 2003). Altruism has been shown to be affected by reputation (for a review, see Barclay, 2012). For example, people behave more altruistically when their behavior is being observed by others (Barclay & Willer, 2007). Both laboratory (e.g., Andreoni & Petrie, 2004; Barclay & Willer, 2007) and field (e.g., Lacetera & Macis, 2010) studies have repeatedly shown that situational factors that trigger concern for reputation promote altruism. Based on these studies, it is probable that individual differences in the sensitivity to reputation (i.e., reputational concern) also relate positively to altruism; in other words, individuals with a high concern for their reputation would display more altruism. However, a recent study has shown that this relationship is not always positive. Kawamura and Kusumi (2018) examined how praise seeking, the tendency to seek a good reputation, and rejection avoidance, the tendency to avoid a bad reputation (Wu, Balliet, & Van Lange, 2016), were related to altruism toward various recipients (i.e., family members, friends/acquaintances, and strangers). As predicted, individuals with higher levels of praise seeking displayed more altruism; however, individuals with higher levels of rejection avoidance displayed less altruism toward strangers. Given that many studies have shown that reputational cues promote altruism, it is important to explore the contextual factors that negatively impact the relationship between reputational concerns and altruism. One possible explanation of this counterintuitive negative relationship is related to social norms. Sometimes altruism deviates from what most others do in a group (i.e., social norm). For example, when a group of co-workers are rushing because they are running late for a train, they may not help a stranger who appears to be searching for lost item at the station platform; in this situation, helping the person is regarded as a non-normative behavior in the group. Some studies suggest that altruism can be negatively evaluated when altruistic behavior is not normative. For example, Parks and Stone (2010) demonstrated that a person who excessively contributed more toward public goods than others was negatively evaluated by other group members. This finding is in line with Kawamura and Kusumi (2018) who measured altruism toward strangers, which is less normative compared to altruism toward more familiar recipients. Taken together these studies suggests that, when altruism is not evaluated as normative, people with high rejection avoidance may inhibit altruistic behavior in fear of possible negative evaluation from others. Thus, individuals who tend to fear rejection from others may inhibit altruism, when altruism was not perceived as normative. However, as Kawamura and Kusumi (2018) did not directly manipulate social norms in their study, this notion needs to be empirically investigated. In the present study, we conducted an online survey to investigate whether the relationship between reputational concern and altruism differed according to social norms. Participants read several vignettes depicting different scenarios, which either provided cues about a prosocial norm or a non-prosocial norm. We predicted that people with high rejection avoidance would inhibit altruism only in the context of non-prosocial norms.