Prosocial Benefits of Feeling Free: Disbelief in Free Will Increases Aggression and Reduces Helpfulness

Abstract

Laypersons' belief in free will may foster a sense of thoughtful reflection and willingness to exert energy, thereby promoting helpfulness and reducing aggression, and so disbelief in free will may make behavior more reliant on selfish, automatic impulses and therefore less socially desirable. Three studies tested the hypothesis that disbelief in free will would be linked with decreased helping and increased aggression. In Experiment 1, induced disbelief in free will reduced willingness to help others. Experiment 2 showed that chronic disbelief in free will was associated with reduced helping behavior. In Experiment 3, participants induced disbelief in free will caused participants to act more aggressively than others. Although the findings do not speak to the existence of free will, the current results suggest that disbelief in free will reduces helping and increases aggression.

Free will beliefs predict attitudes toward unethical behavior and criminal punishment

“…Exposure to anti-free will messages can incite selfishness (8) and aggression (9), both of which have bases in morality (5,10). Chiefly related to the present investigation, treatments that weaken the belief in free will, compared with leaving it unchanged, incite more unethical behavior (e.g., in the form of cheating) (11) and reduce support for harsh punishment for criminals (e.g., by recommending shorter prison sentences) (12).…”

Valuation of Morality and Mind: Morality as a Metacognitive Byproduct

“…Some studies link compatibilist and incompatibilist free will models to moral behaviour (e.g. [58,59]), although none here study the implications of folk philosophy of mind with respect to the belief and value of mind itself (irrespective of its dependency on or otherwise independence from the material world). There is however much related research existent in the literature concerning the negation of belief in mind (e.g.…”

Misconstruing Agency: Issues Related to Free Will and Determinism

“…Finally, participants completed items used in previous research to manipulate or measure free will, including two from Baumeister et al (2009) determinism/free will manipulation ("I am able to override the genetic and environmental factors that sometimes influence my behaviors", "All behavior is determined by brain activity, which in turn is determined by a combination of environmental and genetic factors"-reversed scored), three from Stroessner and Green (1990) Free Will-Determinism Scale-Libertarianism Factor ("I will have free will all of my life", "I have free will in life, regardless of group expectations or pressures"; "I am free to make choices in Science Publications JSS my life regardless of social conditions") and one item ("I have free will even when my choices are limited by external circumstances") that loaded on the free will factor from the Rakos et al (2008). A 5-point scale, ranging from "strongly disagree" to "strongly agree" was used for all of the agency and free will items.…”

“…Baumeister and colleagues reported that exposure to a deterministic perspective decreased the likelihood of helping (Baumeister et al, 2009) and increased the likelihood of cheating (Vohs and Schooler, 2008). Believing in free will has also been positively related to ratings of employee performance (Stillman et al, 2010).…”

“…For example, Rakos et al (2008) described determinism and libertarian free will on opposite ends of a onedimensional continuum varying in degree of agency. Similarly, Baumeister et al (2009) have included sentences like "I demonstrate my free will every day when I make decisions", in manipulations of free will/determinism. Bandura (2006) defined agency as intentionally influencing "one's functioning and life circumstances" (p. 164).…”