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1980 development of altruistic

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Daniel Bar-Tal

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Developmental Psychology
1980, Vol. 16, No. 5,516-524

The Development of Altruistic Behavior:

Empirical Evidence
Daniel Bar-Tal, Amiram Raviv, and Tzipora Leiser
Tel Aviv University

In this study, 124 children in kindergarten and second and fourth grades
were put in situations in which they had an opportunity to share. Five situations
were constructed and ordered according to the sequence of stages of helping
behavior development suggested by Bar-Tal, Raviv, and Sharabany. Each
situation differed according to the conditions in which the sharing could be
performed. Children who did not share in an advanced experimental situa-
tion were provided with an opportunity to share in progressively lower level
experimental situations. After sharing, the children were queried regarding
their motives for sharing. The results of the study showed that the older the
children, the more who shared in the advanced experimental situation; the
older the children, the more advanced the level of motivation for helping behavior
expressed; and the more advanced the experimental situation in which they
shared, the more advanced the level of motivation for helping behavior ex-
pressed by the children. No relationship was found between age and amount
of sharing and between the experimental situations and amount of sharing.
These results are explained in the framework of a theory suggesting that the
quality of helping behavior, as expressed in the motivation to perform it,
develops with age.

In recent years, many studies have been qualitatively disparate from the others in
performed to investigate children's helping view of the different motives precipitating
behavior (for reviews see Bar-Tal, 1976; the helping act. The seriousness of not dif-
Mussen & Eisenberg-Berg, 1977; Rushton, ferentiating among different types of helping
1976). The most common directions of re- acts becomes especially clear when one con-
search have been examinations of ante- siders the subgroup termed altruistic be-
cedents and familial basis, facilitative situa- havior. Although many researchers have
tional conditions, and personality correlates often used the terms helping behavior and
of helping behavior. However, one area of altruistic behavior interchangeably, such
research that has been relatively neglected indiscriminate use of the two terms can lead
is the investigation of motives for helping to basic conceptual misunderstandings.
behavior. This subject certainly merits at- Whereas helping behavior may result from
tention, since helping behavior may be per- various causes, as noted above, what is
formed as a result of many different motives. properly termed altruistic behavior is per-
For example, children may extend help formed only under certain specifically de-
expecting external rewards, to comply with fined conditions. Most researchers agree
others' requests, or to avoid negative social that only a moral act that aims to benefit
sanctions. Although in each of these cases another, that is performed voluntarily, and
the children do in fact help, it seems that that functions as an end in itself with no
each type of behavior must be viewed as expectation of external rewards can be
defined as altruistic behavior (Bar-Tal, 1976;
The authors would like to thank Alex Ingersoll for Berkowitz, 1972, Krebs, 1970). It thus
his helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.
Requests for reprints should be sent to Daniel seems obvious that since children do not
Bar-Tal, School of Education, Tel Aviv University, always help because of altruistic motives,
Tel Aviv, Israel. the study of children's motives for helping
Copyright 1980 by the American Psychological Association, Inc. 0012-1649/80/1605-0516S00.75

516
 DEVELOPMENT OF ALTRUISTIC BEHAVIOR
constitutes a major research question in the
social developmental psychology of pro-
social behavior.
Bar-Tal, Raviv, and Sharabany (Note 1)
have suggested that children's helping be-
havior develops in stages. That is, although
children help from a very early age, the
motives for their helping behavior change
with age. As a result, altruistic behavior
can be considered as a developmental
achievement. Specifically, Bar-Tal et al.,
after analyzing Piaget's stages of thinking
development (Piaget, 1952), Selman's
stages of role-taking development (Selman,
1976), and Kohlberg's stages of moral
judgment development (Kohlberg, 1976),
and on reviewing the literature regarding
reasoning about helping acts (e.g., Baldwin
& Baldwin, 1970), suggested six develop-
mental stages of helping behavior:
1. Compliance with concrete-defined
reinforcement, in which the child carries
out a helping act at a request or command,
but one accompanied by an obvious promise
of concrete reward or an explicit threat of
punishment.
2. Compliance, in which the child carries
out the helping act only in order to comply
with the request or command of an authority.
3. Internal initiative with concrete reward,
in which the child initiates a helping act
recognizing others' needs and with the
expectation of a concrete, defined reward
in return.
4. Normative behavior, in which the
child carries out a helping act to comply
with societal demands and gain social ap-
proval (in this stage the child is able to
take the role of the person in need and to
feel empathy).
5. Generalized reciprocity, in which the
individual initiates a helping act in the belief
that a regulated system of generalized
reciprocity controls helping behavior (1 day
when he/she will need help, he/she will be
helped in return).
6. Altruism, in which individuals initiate
helping acts under the conditions outlined
earlier.
These stages of development imply that
young children will carry out helping acts
only under certain conditions and mostly in
compliance with external authority. How-
517
ever, as they develop cognitive skills (such
as an ability to assume another's perspec-
tive, to delay gratification, to consider
alternative ways of action, or to reason
morally according to postconventional
principles), and as they learn to perform
helping behavior under increasingly com-
plicated conditions, children become capable
of initiating helping acts, including those
definable as altruistic.
The assumption that the motives for help-
ing behavior develop in stages was based
on empirical evidence which indicates that
the frequency and extent of helping behavior
are related to general cognitive development
(e.g., Larsen & Kellogg, 1974), the develop-
ment of social perspective (e.g., Krebs &
Sturrup, 1974), and the development of
moral judgment (e.g., Elmer & Rushton,
1974). This evidence indicates that develop-
mental limitations preclude children from
performing altruistic acts and that they carry
out helping acts in accordance with their
cognitive, social perspective, and moral
development (see also Kohlberg, 1976;
Rushton, 1976).
A number of recent studies have investi-
gated children's stated motives for helping
behavior (e.g., Eisenberg-Berg, 1979; Levin
& Bekerman-Greenberg, in press; Bar-Tal,
Raviv, & Shavit, Note 2). The results of
these studies indicate that children express
more altruistic orientation as they become
older. For example, Eisenberg-Berg (1979)
performed a study in which students of 2nd,
4th, 6th, 9th, llth, and 12th grades were
presented with four stories depicting situa-
tions in which individuals had an opportunity
to provide help at some cost to the helper.
The subjects were asked what these indi-
viduals should do and why. The answers
were coded into 10 categories, which were
not developmentally ordered. She found
that whereas elementary school children
tended to give answers reflecting hedonistic,
stereotyped, and approval-seeking orienta-
tions, high school students tended to give
more answers reflecting emphatic and
more internalized moral concerns.
Although these studies undoubtedly shed
light on the development of helping behavior,
we feel that the results have to be treated
with caution, since verbal expressions of
518 D. BAR-TAL, A. RAVIV, AND T. LEISER
motives or judgments do not necessarily
correspond to the actual motives behind
the behavior. In fact, children often distort
their answers according to notions of social
desirability, or they may be unable to trans-
late their knowledge of expected behavior
into actual reactions. Therefore, there is a
need for an experimental paradigm that
would enable us behaviorally to determine
the development of motives behind the help-
ing behavior. It is the purpose of the present
study to introduce a research paradigm for
investigating the stages of helping behavior
development as proposed by Bar-Tal et
al. (Note 1).
To avoid reliance on children's reports
regarding their motives for helping behavior,
we attempted to create situations parallel-
ing the proposed stages of helping behavior
development; in these situations, the chil-
dren would have an opportunity to carry
out a helping act. Children who did not
use the opportunity to help in a situation
corresponding to a higher stage were given
another opportunity in a situation cor-
responding to a lower stage. The distinct
features of each situation involved the con-
ditions under which the children would be
willing to perform the helping act, that is,
the motives guiding the helping act. Ac-
cordingly, we selected five of the stages
outlined by Bar-Tel et al. (Note 1) and
constructed situations corresponding to
the conditions of each of those stages. The
stages are altruism, normative, internal
initiative with concrete reward, compliance,
and compliance with concrete-defined re-
inforcement. We limited this study to these
five stages only, since we found in a pilot
study that children's expressed motives
corresponded principally to these stages.
We also wanted to limit the number of
stages to avoid unnecessary complica-
tion of the structure of the experiment.
Additionally, to investigate the possible
congruencies between behavior in a specific
situation and the motive expressed after the
fact, we also arranged to solicit motives
following each child's sharing performance.
Finally, on the basis of evidence that the
number of helping acts increases with age
(e.g., Levin & Bekerman-Greenberg, in
press), it was assumed that as children
develop cognitively and morally they are
more willing to extend greater quantities
of help.
We chose to investigate the motives
behind the helping behavior of three age
groups: kindergarten (4Vi-5Vi years old),
second grade (6l/2-lY2 years old), and fourth
grade (8V6-9Vi years old). These three age
groups were selected because they differ
significantly in their levels of cognitive,
social perspective, and moral development.
Thus, though the youngest children were
assumed, on the basis of Piaget's (1952)
classification, to be in the preoperational
period of cognitive development, the older
groups (second and fourth graders) were
assumed to be in the concrete operational
period. Whereas the kindergarten children
were assumed, according to Selman (1976),
to be in the egocentric role-taking stage of
social perspective development (i.e., unable
to differentiate between their own and
others' point of view), the second graders
were assumed to be in the social informa-
tional role-taking stage (i.e., although they
realize that people feel differently, they are
unable to judge simultaneously their own
and others' perspective), and the fourth
graders were assumed to be in the self-
reflective role-taking stage (i.e., unable to
leave a two-person situation and view it
from a third person's perspective). Finally,
according to Bull (1969), the kindergarten
children were assumed to be in the Heternomy
stage of moral development (i.e., morality
imposed by others), whereas the second and
fourth graders were assumed to be in the
Socionomy stage (i.e., morality based on
conformity to social groupings).
The present study was also constructed
to allow for a comparison of the helping
behavior development of boys versus girls.
However, since the literature on helping
behavior reports conflicting results with re-
gard to sex differences (for review see
Bar-Tal, 1976; Krebs, 1970), and since
Bar-Tal et al. (Note 2) did not find any sex
differences regarding motives for helping
behavior, no specific hypothesis was stated
in this regard.
Given an experimental situation involving
three age groups of children presented with
the possibility of sharing a fixed quantity
 DEVELOPMENT OF ALTRUISTIC BEHAVIOR
of candy under progressively less advanced
experimental conditions, we hypothesized
that (a) The older the group of children,
the greater the percentage of sharing in the
more advanced experimental conditions; (b)
similarly, the older the group of children,
the more advanced the level of motives
expressed for sharing; (c) children exhibit-
ing sharing in the advanced experimental
conditions will also express advanced
motives for sharing; (d) the older the group
of children, the greater the number of candies
shared; and (e) children sharing in the ad-
vanced experimental conditions will likewise
share a greater number of candies.
Method
Subjects
Subjects were 124 children (61 boys and 63 girls)
in three age groups: 42 kindergarten children (19
boys, 23 girls) aged 4!4-51/4; 40 second-grade children
(22 boys, 18 girls) aged 6!/2-7'/i; and 42 fourth-grade
children (21 boys, 21 girls) aged 8^-9^. All of the
children were from middle-class socioeconomic back-
grounds. Actually, double this number of children
took part in the experiment; as will be described
below, children were tested in same-sex pairs, but
since only one of the pair was in a position to share,
we refer only to those 124 children for whom data on
sharing were collected.
Procedure
Working beforehand with their teachers, we divided
each group into pairs of children according to the
following criteria: same sex, same birth order, and
each pair being neither particularly close friends
nor enemies. The teachers explained to their classes
that they were going to meet with a woman from the
Ministry of Education who was studying children's
games and thoughts. Then the teacher sent each pair
of children to the separate room used by the experi-
menter (the last author). On entering the room, each
pair was greeted by the experimenter, who was
unaware of the exact nature of the hypotheses. She
explained that she was investigating children's ability
to guess numbers, and said that she would think of a
number between 0 and 10 and that each child would
have three chances to guess this number. The chil-
dren were told that the game would be played five times
and whichever child won the most would receive a
prize. Each time, before the game, the experimenter
randomly decided which child would win, so that at
the end, the prizewinner would have "guessed cor-
rectly" three times and the loser only twice. The
"winner" was then given seven pieces of candy1 and
was told that he/she could now do whatever he/she
desired with the prize.
519
The actual process of examining the reaction of the
child started from this point of the experiment. The
winners were each automatically-put in a situation
in which they could share the candy; if they failed to
do so, additional opportunities corresponding to the
hypothesized stages of helping behavior were then
created.
In the first condition of the experiment, the altruistic
condition (A), the experimenter left the room under
the pretext that she had to talk with the secretary for
a few minutes, thereby leaving the children alone.
When she returned to the room after 3 minutes, the
experimenter determined unobtrusively whether the
winner had shared the candy with the other child
("the loser").2 If the winner had shared, the loser
was asked to sit in the corner, the winner was inter-
viewed as to the motive for sharing, and both chil-
dren were debriefed, asked not to talk about the
experiment, and sent back to the classroom. If the
winner did not share the candy, the experiment con-
tinued to the second condition.
In the second condition, the normative condition
(N), the experimenter said that she was going to read
a story, asked the children to listen carefully, and
said that an instruction about what to do would be
given at the end of the story reading. The story ref-
ferring to a same-sex child read as follows:
A child was invited to a birthday party and there
received a bag filled with candy. On the way home,
the child met his/her friend who asked about the bag.
The child said that he/she had received some candy
and decided to share it with the friend. Both of them
sat down and ate the candy. It is very nice to share
candies with a friend. Good children share candy
with other children who do not have any.
(The purpose of reading the story was to remind them
about the norm prescribing helping; see Leeds, 1963.)
After finishing the story, the experimenter again left
the room for 3 minutes, saying that she had to talk with
the teacher for a while. After returning to the room,
the experimenter again determined unobtrusively
whether the winner had shared the candy with the
loser. If the winner had shared, the experimenter
inquired as to the motives, debriefed the children, and
sent them back to the classroom. If the winner had
not shared, the experiment continued to the third
condition.
In the third condition, internal initiative and concrete
reward (IICR), the experimenter told the children that
when speaking to the teacher, the teacher had said
that a child who shared candy with other chil-
dren would get the important role in a play that she
was preparing for an uncoming holiday. At this point,
the experimenter made herself busy with her papers,
moving to the corner of the room, arranging and writing
notes, and leaving the children free for 3 minutes.
1
The prize was determined on the basis of pupils'
evaluations of the attractiveness of various prizes.
The prize selected for the present study was similarly
evaluated by the children of the three age groups.
2
No loser in any of the conditions asked the winner
to share.
520 D. BAR-TAL, A. RAVIV, AND T. LEISER
Table 1
Distribution of Children Who Shared,
According to Experimental Conditions
and Grade
Grade
Experimental Kinder-
conditions garten 2nd 4th
A and N 3 (7) 9 (22.5) 16 (38)
IICR and C 29 (69) 27 (67.5) 25 (60)
CCDR 10 (24) 4 (10) 1 (2)
Total 42(100) 40(100) 42(100)
Note. A = altruistic; N = normative; IICR = internal
initiative and concrete reward; C = compliance;
CCDR = compliance and concrete-defined reinforce-
ment. Numbers in parentheses are percentages.
If the winner shared the candy with the loser, the
procedure of inquiry and debriefing was performed.
If the winner still did not share the candy, however, the
experiment continued to the next stage.
In the fourth condition, compliance (C), the experi-
menter told the winner to share the candy with the
other child and moved to the corner of the room for 2
minutes. If the winner shared, the experimenter inter-
viewed him/her and debriefed the children. If the winner
still did not share, the experiment continued to its last
phase. In thefifthcondition, compliance and concrete -
defined reinforcement (CCDR), the experimenter told
the winner to share the candy and, in return, promised
to give a big prize. No child refused to share in this
last stage. Each child was interviewed regarding the
motive for sharing and was given 10 candies. The
debriefing revealed that none of the children were
aware of the purpose of the experiment or bored
with its procedure.
Dependent Variables
Three dependent variables were used in this study;
the stage at which the child shared the candy with the
other child; the explanation that the child provided as to
his/her motive for sharing; and the number of candies
that the child gave to the second child.
Results
First, since preliminary analysis showed
that no sex differences were evidenced, the
data for the boys and girls were combined.
Also, two experimental conditions were
markedly underrepresented: N and IICR
contained only six children between them
for all grades. Therefore, we combined the
N and A conditions, the common feature
being voluntary initiation of sharing without
any promise of external reward. Similarly,
IICR was combined with C, since both
conditions involved gaining the approval of
an authority (the teacher or the experimenter)
and are assumed to be developmentally
sequential.
Relationship Between Experimental
Conditions and Age
Regarding our first hypothesis, the
distribution according to age for the three
combined experimental conditions is pre-
sented in Table 1. A chi-square analysis
indicated a significant relationship between
the age of the children and the stage
of experimental condition, x2(4) = 17.35,
p < .01. Whereas 38% of the fourth-grade
children shared in the A and N conditions,
only 7% of the kindergarten children did so.
Conversely, though 24% of the youngest
group shared only in the final, CCDR
condition, just 2% (one child) in the oldest
group did so.
Relationship Between Age and Reported
Motives for Sharing
The answers of the children regarding
their motives for sharing were classified on
the basis of the Bar-Tal et al. (Note 1) theory
of stages of helping behavior development
by two judges with 92% interjudge agree-
ment. The following seven working cate-
gories were determined:
Category 1. Sharing was done because
of the promised prize (e.g., "You promised
me a prize"; "I wanted the prize").
Category 2. Sharing was done because
the experimenter told the child to do so
("You told me to"; "Because when an adult
tells me to do something, I do it").
Category 3. Sharing was done because
the child believed that he/she would receive
a concrete reward for performing the act
("If I share, he/she will help me later with
my homework").
Category 4. Sharing was done on the
basis of a normative belief prescribing
sharing with other children. Conformity
with this norm gains social approval for the
person ("It's nice to share"; "It is written
in the Bible that you shall love your neigh-
bor as yourself").
Category 5. Sharing was done on the
basis of a belief in a general social rule that
 DEVELOPMENT OF ALTRUISTIC BEHAVIOR
people who share or help are shared with
or helped in return when they are in need
("Next time, when I need something, some-
body with also share with me").
Category 6. Sharing was done on the
basis of personal willingness to share, with-
out any expectation of receiving an external
reward (social or material) but with an
expression of self-satisfaction ("I like to
share, to give others satisfaction").
Category 7. Sharing was done on the
basis of a personal empathetic willingness to
share, without expressed expectation of any
kind of reward ("Candy should be shared to
make the other child happy").
Because of the small number of children
who expressed Categories 1, 2, 5, and 6, we
collapsed the seven categories into three,
with 1, 2, and 3, representing lower level
motives;'4 and 5 being normative; and 6 and
7 being altruistic.
A chi-square analysis of the relationship
between age and categories indicated a
significant relationship, x2 (4) = 10.98, p <
.05. The distribution of the children's re-
ported motives (presented in Table 2)
indicates that although among the youngest
group 45% expressed low-level motives,
only 19% of the oldest group did so. Also,
19% of the oldest children expressed high-
level motives, whereas only 5% of the
youngest group did so.
Relationship Between Experimental
Conditions and Reported Motives
Table 3 shows the distribution of children
according to categories of expressed motives
in experimental conditions. Analysis of this
relationship yielded x2 (4) = 11.07,p < .05.
Table 2
Distribution of Children According to Expressed
Motives for Sharing in the Three Age Groups
Grade
Kinder-
Categories garten 2nd 4th
1, 2, and 3 19 (45) 10 (25) 8 (19)
4 and 5 21 (50) 27 (67.5) 26 (62)
6 and 7 2 (5) 3 (7.5) 8 (19)
Total 42 (100) 40 (100) 42 (100)
Note. Numbers in parentheses are percentages.
521
Table 3
Distribution of Children According to Expressed
Motives for Sharing in the Experimental
Conditions
Experimental conditions
Categories A and N IICR and C CCDR
1, 2, and 3 3 (11) 16 (20) 8 (53)
4 and 5 21 (75) 53 (65) 7 (47)
6 and 7 4 (14) 12 (15) 0 (0)
Total 28(100) 81 (100) 15(100)
Note. A = altruistic; N = normative; IICR = internal
initiative and concrete reward; C = compliance;
CCDR = compliance and concrete-defined reinforce-
ment. Numbers in parentheses are percentages.
The data indicate that whereas only 11% of
the children who shared in the high-level
A or N conditions expressed low-level
motives, 53% of the children who shared
in the low-level CCDR condition expressed
similarly low-level motives. Conversely,
14% of the children who shared in the A
or N condition expressed compatible high-
level motives, whereas none of the children
who shared in the CCDR condition expressed
these motives.
Number of Candies Shared as a Function
of Age and Experimental Condition
Table 4 shows the mean number of candies
shared as a function of age and experimental
condition. Two one-way analyses (3 x 1)
were performed to examine the effect of age
(three age groups) and experimental condi-
tions on sharing (three conditions).3 The
first analysis yielded an insignificant result
regarding age, F(2, 118) = 1.99, p < .15;
the second analysis yielded a significant
result for experimental conditions, F(2,
118) = 3.59, p < .05.
With regard to the second analysis,
individual comparisons using the Duncan
new multiple-range test showed that children
in the IICR and C conditions shared signif-
icantly more candies than children in the A
and N conditions (p < .05). The difference
3
Two-way analyses of variance were not performed
because the distribution of subjects in each cell differed
greatly (between 1 and 29), and no specific interac-
tion effect was hypothesized (see Winer, 1971).
522 D. BAR-TAL, A. RAVIV, AND T. LEISER
Table 4
Mean Number of Shared Candies According
to Experimental Conditions and Grade
Grade
Experi-
mental Kinder-
conditions garten 2nd 4th Total M
A and N 1.66 (3) 1.77 (9) 2.50(16) 2.18(28)
IICRandC 2.38(29) 2.92(27) 3.24(25) 2.78(81)
CCDR 2.50(10) 3.25 (4) 1.00 (1) 2.71(15)
Total M 2.39(42) 2.75(40) 2.85(42)
Note. Figures in parentheses are ns. A = altruistic;
N = normative; IICR = internal initiative and con-
crete reward; C = compliance; CCDR = compliance
and concrete-defined reinforcement.
between the CCDR condition and the A and
N conditions only approached signifi-
cance (p < .10).
Discussion
The results of the present study support
the hypothesis that motives for helping be-
havior develop with age. Although the
motor act of helping itself might be the same
across various ages, the motives for the act
change, and as a result, the conditions under
which the individual carries out helping
behavior vary. Thus, the quality of the
behavior changes with age. Only older
children who have developed the cognitive
skills necessary to perform altruistic be-
havior and who have learned how to carry
this out are able to behave altruistically.
In the present study, a relationship be-
tween age and the experimental condi-
tions was found to exist, that is, the older
the children, the more they shared under the
altruistic and normative conditions. They
initiated the sharing themselves, without
any promise of external reward, and in the
altruistic condition, they shared without
being reminded of the social norm involved.
Conversely, the younger the children, the
greater the number who shared under the
condition of compliance with the promise
of a concrete-defined reward in return for
the sharing. However, the greatest number
of children in all three age groups shared
under the condition of compliance (see
Table 1). Two explanations are offered for
this latter finding. First, it is possible that
children at these ages tend not to initiate
helping acts in unfamiliar situations when
they are unsure of what is expected. Sec-
ond, on receiving the candy as a prize,
most of the children may have felt that the
prize was not supposed to be shared, whereas
in another situation the same candy would
be shared. It seems that the second explana-
tion can be eliminated on the basis of the
debriefing sessions in which all of the chil-
dren said that they understood that they
had the freedom to share their prize. The
first explanation, however, appears to be
supported by Staub's (1970) finding indicat-
ing that children who have learned rules of
"appropriate" social behavior may still be
inhibited from helping in unfamilar environ-
ments for fear of possible disapproval result-
ing from potentially inappropriate conduct.
Our finding regarding the relationship
between age and expressed motives for
sharing indicates that the older the children,
the more often they will express more
advanced motives for sharing, and the
younger the children, the more often less ad-
vanced motives for sharing will be expressed.
Close to half (45%) of the younger chil-
dren explained that they shared in com-
pliance with the experimenter's request,
because of a promise of external reward, or
because of a combination of these elements
(see Table 2). Eight-one percent of the older
children explained their sharing as being
due to normative obligations, generalized
reciprocity expectations, or altruistic mo-
tives. However, here too, the predominant
response for all groups fell into the middle
range, that is, normative or generalized
reciprocity obligations. This result seems to
indicate that children, even at an early age,
know what is expected of them and are able
to verbalize it.
The relationship between expressed
motives and level of sharing indicates that
the majority of children who shared under
the condition of compliance and promise
of external reward (CCDR) also explained
their behavior with primitive motives (see
Table 3). However, the majority of children
who shared in other conditions used
more advanced motives—principally giving
expressions ofi normative or generalized
 DEVELOPMENT OF ALTRUISTIC BEHAVIOR
reciprocity requirements, as did close to half
of those children exhibiting CCDR sharing.
Only a minority of the children expressed
most advanced motives (altruism) as an
explanation for their behavior. This result
shows that whereas the majority of the chil-
dren shared as a result of compliance with
external authority, they also recited norma-
tive requirements as reasons for the sharing
act; this supports the finding by Bryan and
Walbek (1970) showing that although chil-
dren are able to verbalize social require-
ments, they do not necessarily behave
according to them.
The last two hypotheses, both uncon-
firmed, dealt with the degree of sharing
in a particular sharing act. One analysis
showed that children of different ages did
not differ significantly in the number of candies
they shared. Although the means were in
line with the hypothesis, results were below
the accepted level of significance. The sec-
ond analysis showed that children who
initiated the sharing but expected a reward
in return (IICR) and children who com-
plied with the experimenter's request (C)
shared significantly more candies than did
children in the altruistic and normative
experimental conditions. The difference be-
tween children who shared in the CCDR
condition and A and N conditions only
approached the acceptable level of sig-
nificance. This result indicates that between
the ages of 5-10, children who expect a
reward or are told to share do so quan-
titatively more than do children who initiate
the behavior themselves without expecting
an external reward. Thus, both a promise
of reward and an order have a greater effect
than do more intrinsic motivations. Chil-
dren in the former conditions not only felt
compelled to share but probably also ex-
perienced pressure from the experimenter
to share large quantities. In addition, it is
possible that children who shared in these
situations were reacting to the manipula-
tions and the cumulative effects of more
subtle pressures and cues for compliance
experienced in earlier situations; therefore,
they also gave larger quantities.
In sum, the results of the present study
generally support the hypothesis that al-
though children of young age are clearly
523
able to perform helping acts, the quality of
helping behavior changes with age. That is,
as children develop more advanced cog-
nitive, social perspective, and moral ori-
entations, they are capable of performing
helping acts of a higher moral quality.
These results are in line with the findings
of Raviv, Bar-Tal, and Lewis-Levin (in
press), who studied donation behavior of
boys in the fourth, sixth, and eighth grades.
They showed that the older the children,
the greater the percentage of donors in
altruistic or normative experimental situa-
tions, and the more advanced the experi-
mental donation situation, the more ad-
vanced the level of expressed motivation
for the donation behavior.
This does not imply that older children
never help as a result of egoistic motives
or compliance. However, younger children
are not able to help as a result of high-level
moral motives. In this vein, Kohlberg
(1976) has suggested that
"there is a horizontal sequence of steps in move-
ment from logic to social perception to moral judg-
ment. . . . There is one final step in this horizontal
sequence: moral behavior. To act in a morally high
way requires a high stage of moral reasoning" (p. 32).
The development of cognitive, social per-
spective, and moral orientations, however,
is only one necessary condition for per-
forming altruistic acts. The children also
have to learn to put these potentials into
operation. This learning process is related
to cognitive, social perspective, and moral
development. That is, whereas in the early
stages of development it is necessary to use
such social learning techniques as orders or
promises of tangible rewards, in later stages
social rewards are enough. In more ad-
vanced stages there is no need to use external
techniques, since children can utilize ex-
pectations as mechanisms that perpetuate
the performance of helping acts.
Reference Notes
Bar-Tal, D., Raviv, A., & Sharabany, R. Cognitive
basis of the development of altruistic behavior.
Paper presented at the conference of the Inter-
national Society for the Study of Behavioral Develop-
ment, Pavia, Italy, September 1977.
524 D. BAR-TAL, A. RAVIV, AND T. LEISER
2. Bar-Tal, D., Raviv, A., & Shavit, N. Motives for
helping behavior expressed by kindergarten and
school children in kibbutz and city. Unpublished
manuscript, Tel Aviv University, 1978.
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Received December 13, 1979