We can all identify with that warm glow feeling we experience when our kind gesture makes someone smile – but is there any science behind it?
The question of whether human nature is good or bad has puzzled philosophers for centuries, but there is scientific evidence that shows being kind doesn’t just make us feel good, but our brains reward us for it.
To gain further understanding of why kindness is so powerful, I conducted a research experiment with Dr Dan Campbell-Meiklejohn at the University of Sussex, where we studied the brain activity from over 1,000 participants.
We gave each person money that they could either keep for themselves or give away to another person or a charity, while making two types of kindness decisions: strategic or altruistic.
If they choose to give it away, the receiver could return the favour – so there is an incentive to be kind (a strategic decision).
In other situations, there was no way the participant could benefit financially from their kindness and their decision was anonymous, without praise or recognition. This is known as altruism and the only possible motivation is the warm glow or feel-good factor.
We found that in both cases, generosity activated the reward networks of the brain – the same regions that light up when we eat nice food or look at someone we love.
In other words, being kind makes us feel good, and receiving money and giving it away activates the same brain areas.
Neuroscientists have made similar discoveries when researching empathy.
The fact people give when there is nothing to get in return – combined with the brain’s ‘warm glow’ – suggests that kindness is rewarding both for the person receiving the kindness and the person being kind.
When someone else feels pain, the same areas of our brain are active as when we experience pain ourselves.
Some researchers have suggested kindness is actually selfishness in disguise – people are motivated by what they can get in return for being kind.
However, our experiment revealed that the part of the brain called the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex is most activated and glows strongest when we give something away that has no possible benefit for ourselves.
The fact people give when there is nothing to get in return – combined with the brain’s ‘warm glow’ – suggests that kindness is rewarding both for the person receiving the kindness and the person being kind.
The next step is to identify why people are kind in some situations and unkind in others.
Our current research, and work by other scientists, looks at how empathy can collapse when the people suffering are far away or in very large groups.
Human beings’ empathy systems evolved to care about small numbers of people close to us as for most of human history, these were the only people we were aware of. When we see others as distant, different or part of an unemotional statistic, it’s easier to justify unkindness.
However, technology has made the world a smaller place, giving us unique opportunities to help people who don’t live near us but are desperately in need.
There are claims that humans are selfish by nature, only interested in what benefits them directly and that evolution favoured those who were best at competing against others.
But now we know how kindness affects us and that it can change or save lives, we should be motivated to connect with others.
By focusing on what we have in common and the positive impacts of helping, we can encourage our kind nature, make a difference for others – and feel good about it, too.
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source https://metro.co.uk/2019/11/13/the-scientific-reason-why-you-should-be-kind-11079432/
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