Personality and Individual Differences 51 (2011) 216–221

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Personality and Individual Differences

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid

Personality and altruism in the dictator game: Relationship to giving to kin,

collaborators, competitors, and neutrals
Avner Ben-Ner a,*, Amit Kramer b
a
Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455, United States
b
School of Labor and Employment Relations, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL 61820, United States

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: We investigate altruism in the context of the economic dictator game experiment where subjects are pre-
Received 19 January 2010 sented with different persons who can be classified as kin, collaborator, competitor and neutral based on
Received in revised form 12 April 2010 their similarity/relationship to the subject. The classification is based on the role others play in facilitating
Accepted 28 April 2010
or impeding an individual’s access to resources needed for reproductive success. The role of the Big Five
Available online 8 June 2010
personality traits in giving to the different target persons is examined. We find that kin are treated most
generously, followed by collaborators, neutrals, and competitors. Personality has no effect on giving to
Keywords:
kin, but a significant effect on giving to collaborator, neutral and competitor. We also find non-linear rela-
Altruism
Dictator game
tionships between personality and giving.
Personality Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Identity
Kin
Reciprocal altruism

1. Introduction Altruism has been investigated mostly relative to generic

Altruistic behavior is a sacrifice of one’s resources for the benefit
of others, representing a tradeoff between one’s self-interest and
regard for others. Resources can include time (helping an elderly
person cross the street, visiting a sick relative), money (donating
money to a religious organization), or flesh (donating blood, plas-
ma or organs).
In the psychological literature, altruism is usually measured by
asking respondents how they would behave or feel towards other
people in various situations, e.g., whether they would donate blood
or help others in need (e.g., Rushton, Chrisjohn, & Fekken, 1981), or
record actual behavior (e.g., Ferguson, Farrell, & Lawrence, 2008,).
In economics, altruism has been measured by the amount of
money an individual is willing to give to someone else, usually in
the context of an experiment called the dictator game (DG). In this
experiment, each subject in the role of ‘‘sender” is granted a mon-
etary endowment and is asked to consider keeping it or sending
any portion of it to another person. Experiments similar to the
DG have also been used in psychology (e.g., Ashton, Paunonen,
Helmes, & Jackson, 1998; Tajfel’s 1970). The amount sent is
regarded as a measure of other-regarding or altruism (Andreoni
& Miller, 2002; Ben-Ner & Putterman, 1998).
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 612 723 5558.
E-mail addresses: benne001@umn.edu (A. Ben-Ner), kram0262@umn.edu
(A. Kramer).
‘‘other” persons who were usually not further identified. To assess
the role of the attributes of the potential beneficiary of altruistic
acts the reader may conduct a mental exercise by imagining a ‘‘per-
son.” What describes that person? Man or woman, young or old, an
acquaintance or a stranger, from your country or from abroad, be-
liever or agnostic? Would you respond to a survey or give in a DG
the same way if you imagined the other person as a man, young, an
acquaintance, from your country and your own religion, or, alter-
natively, if you thought the other person was a woman, old, a
stranger, from another country, and from a different religion?
In this paper we focus on the concept of altruism as expressed
by the willingness-to-give money in the DG and investigate how
this tendency varies with respect to the attribute similarity between
the sender and the receiver. Following a recent call by Borghans,
Duckworth, Heckman, and ter Weel (2008) we investigate how
heterogeneity in altruism, as manifested by giving in the DG, is
related to personality traits.
From an evolutionary-theoretical perspective, scholars argued
that there are two types of altruism: kin altruism (Hamilton,
1964) and reciprocal altruism (Trivers, 1971). Evolutionary theory
emphasizes reproduction and resources that facilitate it as well as
providing for oneself and one’s offspring and for relatives and their
offspring. The resources include food, safety and physical protec-
tion, all of which are, and have been in the ancestral environment,
in scarce supply. Kin altruism implies helping related persons in
order to improve their – and one’s own – reproductive success.

0191-8869/$ - see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.paid.2010.04.024
 A. Ben-Ner, A. Kramer / Personality and Individual Differences 51 (2011) 216–221
Kin altruism is undergirded by kin selection, which consists of the
evolution of characteristics conducive to the reproductive success
of close relatives including willingness to sacrifice resources that
aid one’s own reproduction for the benefit of kin and the ability
to discern kin from others (Hamilton, 1964; Daly & Wilson,
1988). Reciprocal altruism entails making sacrifices for unrelated
others who are likely to provide at least as much help in the future
in a reciprocal fashion, so it entails an evolved ability to recognize
potential partners to transactions and the likelihood that they will
indeed reciprocate (Fehr & Fischbacher, 2003; Trivers, 1971).
But kin and potential collaborators are not the only types of
persons an individual may interact with. Some persons may be
regarded as foes or competitors, and others as neither friend
nor foe. On the basis of an individual’s direct or cultural experi-
ences he or she may classify other persons as either (1) kin, (2)
a collaborator or potential contributor to one’s reproductive and
survivability resources, (3) a direct competitor for or absconder
of such resources, or (4) a neutral, someone who has no bearing
on these resources. Individuals classify other people into these
categories on the basis of observed attributes, the expected future
benefits and threats from interaction with them, and what they
learn from their own culture. Person 1 may be an individual’s
identical twin or a possible relative. Person 2 may be a friend, a
neighbor, a coworker, or someone adhering to the same religion.
Person 3 may be an active member of an enemy group that
wishes to take away one’s myriad resources, a member of an
opposing tribe or a fan of a rival sports team. Person 4 may be
a member of a geographically-distant and non-competing tribe
or a random person in the street.
The nature of altruism towards each of these persons is differ-
ent. Person 1 will be treated most favorably as a direct investment
in one’s reproduction; person 2 would be treated favorably to the
degree that one expects this person will reciprocate, but would
be treated less favorably than kin; person 3 would be undermined,
or treated least generously, depending on the nature of the interac-
tion; and person 4 will be treated less generously than kin and col-
laborators but more generously than competitors. We test this
hypothesized ordering of the degree of altruism in giving to the
four types of persons, going beyond the standard in-group/out-
group dichotomy and extending the investigation of the effects of
identity categories (Ben-Ner, McCall, Stephane, & Wang, 2009)
and of social distance (Osiński, 2009).
The literature on personality and altruism is limited. Ashton
et al. (1998) examine the relationship between personality and
kin and reciprocal altruism. They hypothesize that kin altruism en-
tails assessment of costs and benefits to one’s kin and thus should
be related to empathy and attachment traits, thus negatively to
emotional stability and positively to agreeableness, whereas reci-
procal altruism entails forgiveness and retaliation, thus positively
related to emotional stability and agreeableness. Their findings
generally support the hypothesized relationships. Osiński (2009)
augments the framework used by Ashton et al. (1998) by examin-
ing the effect of social distance on the relationship between per-
sonality and kin and reciprocal altruism. He finds that altruism
declines with social distance and with the other’s willingness to
reciprocate, and is positively associated with agreeableness and
negatively with neuroticism. Krueger, Hicks, and McGue (2001)
investigate the relationship between personality traits and altru-
ism and antisocial behavior. They find that altruism and antisocial
behavior are unrelated, and that altruism is associated with posi-
tive emotionality whereas antisocial behavior is related to negative
emotionality. Other studies find that charitable giving is positively
associated with openness and extraversion, whereas blood and
organ donation are positively associated with agreeableness
(Bekkers, 2006), that volunteerism is weakly and positively associ-
ated with agreeableness (Carlo, Okun, Knight, & de Guzman, 2005),
217
and that after controlling for attachment insecurities, there is no
association between personality and volunteering (Erez, Mikulin-
cer, van Ijzendoorn, & Kroonenberg, 2008).
There have been only a handful of studies that investigated the
relationship between personality and giving in the context of the
DG. Ben-Ner, Kong, and Putterman (2004a) find that when the re-
ceiver is identified only as a ‘‘person”, openness is positively asso-
ciated with giving, but when the gender of the receiver is
identified, agreeableness is mildly and positively associated with
giving, whereas extraversion affects negatively males’ giving and
neuroticism affects negatively females’ giving (Ben-Ner,
Putterman, Kong, & Magan, 2004b). Ben-Ner, Kramer, and Levy
(2008) find that giving with actual and hypothetical money is
nearly identical on average, but there are differences associated
with personality: agreeableness is associated with greater giving
with actual money, whereas extraversion is associated with more
generous giving of hypothetical money. Swope, Cadigan, Schmitt,
and Shupp (2008) did not find associations between personality
and giving in the DG.
The research on the relationship between altruism and person-
ality thus suggests that altruism is positively associated with
agreeableness and negatively with neuroticism. In our empirical
work we test for associations between these and other personality
traits and giving in the DG, and investigate the possibility that
these associations are not linear. Although personality effects are
usually assumed to be linear, studies have shown that this is not
always so (e.g., Cucina & Vasilopoulos, 2005; Day & Silverman,
1989; Egloff & Hock, 2001; Robins, Tracy, & Trzesniewski, 2001).
In addition, we examine whether the association between person-
ality and giving depends on the target of the altruism (kin, collab-
orator, competitor, and neutral).
2. Methods
2.1. Participants
All freshmen at the University of Minnesota were invited to
participate in economic-psychological experiments; nearly 10% re-
sponded, with 222 actually showing up at the experiment. The
average age of the sample was 18.8 years, with female and Cauca-
sian majorities (64.0% and 71.4%, respectively).
2.2. Materials and design
Participants were assigned to one of two identical sessions. Sub-
jects completed the following steps: (1) a timed 12-min cognitive-
ability test, (2) a personality inventory, (3) a willingness-to-give
survey-experiment, (4) four more experiments that are not used
in this paper (discussed in Ben-Ner et al., 2009), and (5) a detailed
personal background questionnaire. Each step was contained in a
separate envelope that was sealed after its completion. Subjects
were then paid a $15 participation fee.
In step 3 subjects were asked to consider seriatim and sepa-
rately 91 individuals, each characterized by one descriptor such
as ‘‘is tall,” ‘‘is from Argentina,” or ‘‘is your brother in law”. The
analysis in the present paper uses the altruistic decisions subjects
made (step 3) and the data collected on subjects’ cognitive ability,
personality traits and background.
Of the 222 subjects, 20 participated in a DG with just one other
person (female) to test for possible bias associated with the inclu-
sion of multiple persons in the same experiment. Tests show that
there is no statistically significant difference between what the
202 subjects gave to a female in the multiple-person experiment
and what the 20 subjects in the single-person experiment gave a
female.
218 A. Ben-Ner, A. Kramer / Personality and Individual Differences 51 (2011) 216–221

Fig. 1. Distribution of giving in dollars (horizontal axis), by category (kin, collaborator, neutral and competitor).

2.3. Classification into different groups Table 2

Mean and standard deviation of giving, by category (in dollars).

Of the 91 ‘‘other persons” included in the experiment, we clas- Mean giving Mean giving Mean giving Mean giving
sify 74 persons into groups of kin, potential collaborators, potential to kin to collaborator to neutral to competitor

competitors and neutrals on the basis of the relationship between Meana 4.91 3.40 2.49 1.99
the information we collected about each subject and the other per- Standard 3.59 3.30 2.97 2.61
deviation
son (17 persons could not be classified). Details of the matching
Number of 790 2918 7105 3760
procedure are available from the authors. The two authors of the decisions
paper independently coded each person into one of the four a
All means are different from each other at the .01 level.
groups. For only three persons out of the 74 there was disagree-
ment; after discussion a consensus has been achieved.

2.4. Analysis giving to the four different groups. Subjects give most to kin
($4.91), followed by collaborators ($3.40), neutrals ($2.49) and
We first compare the means of amount given to the four groups. competitors ($1.99). All differences are significant at the .01 level.
Next, we analyze giving to persons in each of the four groups in Fig. 1 presents the distribution of giving to persons in each group,
relation to personality, controlling for cognitive ability, gender, which shows that in almost 50% of the observations nothing is
age, and birth order. We use random-effects GLS regression to ac- given to competitors as compared to less than 20% for giving to
count for the multiple decisions made by each subject. Because kin. In only 5% of the observations competitors are given more than
giving was constrained between zero and ten we also use Tobit $5, but in more than 30% of the observations kin are given more
analysis. To account for the skewed distribution of giving, with than $5. Table 3 provides further evidence for the hypothesized
many subjects giving zero, especially to competitors (see Fig. 1), order of giving. Controlling for the Big Five personality traits, birth
we also use Poisson regression. The results were very similar in order, age, gender and cognitive ability, subjects gave $2.40 more
all three types of analysis, hence we show only the random-effects to kin than to neutrals (column 1; p < .01), 90 cents more to collab-
GLS results. The number of subjects with valid observations is 181 orators than to neutrals (p < .01) and 49 cents less to competitors
instead of 202 because of missing values. than to neutrals (p < .01). Thus the results support our basic
hypothesis.
Concerning results for personality, consider first Model 1 in
3. Results
Table 3. In this model the personality variables are entered linearly
and without interactions, with only extraversion showing a
Table 1 provides the mean, standard deviation and pair-wise
statistically significant effect on giving. In Model 2 we allow for
correlations of the study variables. Table 2 provides the mean
quadratic effects of personality, yet without interaction with the
Table 1 type of other person. We find that subjects higher on neuroticism
Descriptive statistics of the study’s variables. give significantly more (b = .19, p < .05) but giving declines with in-
creases in neuroticism, as evidenced by the negative coefficient of
Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5
the quadratic term (b = .003, p < .10). Subjects higher on extraver-
1. Mean giving 2.74 2.12 –
sion give significantly less money (b = .46, p < .05) but this nega-
2. Neuroticism 22.09 7.64 .04 –
3. Extraversion 30.74 6.43 .19** .33** –
tive effect is reversed at higher levels of extraversion, as evident
4. Openness 29.29 6.48 .11 .05 .08 – from the quadratic term (b = .009, p < .01). We find similar results
5. Agreeableness 30.83 5.61 .01 .27** .43** .06 – for conscientiousness. Subjects higher on conscientiousness give
6. Conscientiousness 31.14 6.18 .05 .32** .14* .17* .10 significantly less money (b = .54, p < .01) but this negative effect
*
p < .05. is diminishing as evident from the quadratic term (b = .008,
**
p < .01. p < .01) and in fact becomes positive at high levels of
 A. Ben-Ner, A. Kramer / Personality and Individual Differences 51 (2011) 216–221 219

Table 3 conscientiousness. For agreeableness we find an initial positive ef-

Determinants of giving to other persons, random-effects GLM regression. fect (but statistically not significant), but giving declines at higher
Model 1 Model 2a Model 3b,c levels of agreeableness. Based on these results we fail to support
Kin 2.40**
2.40**
2.38** our hypotheses about the relationship between neuroticism and
(.08) (.08) (.08) agreeableness and altruism. Surprisingly, neuroticism is positively
Collaborator .90** .90** .90** related to giving and only at high levels of neuroticism do we ob-
(.05) (.05) (.05) serve a negative effect. Agreeableness is not related to giving. Mod-
Competitor .49** .49** .49**
(.05) (.05) (.05)
el 3 includes interactions between the different personality traits
Neuroticism .04 .19* .03 and the target groups dummies, which permit us to examine the
(.03) (.10) (.03) moderating effects of personality on giving to persons belonging
Extraversion .11** .46* .10** to different categories. Because we are interested in understanding
(.03) (.22) (.03)
the moderating role of personality more clearly, we analyze giving
Openness .01 .12 .00
(.03) (.16) (.03) to persons in each of the four categories (kin, collaborator, neutral
Agreeableness .05 .37 .07* and competitor) separately in Table 4.
(.03) (.24) (.03) In Table 4, as a group, the squared terms on personality traits in
Conscientiousness .02 .54** .04 Model 2 are statistically significant for all target groups except kin.
(.03) (.18) (.03)
We therefore emphasize findings based on Model 2. As hypothe-
Neuroticism squared .003 .004
(.002) (.002) sized, personality plays a very limited role in explaining altruistic
Extraversion squared .009* .009** behavior towards kin. Only extraversion seems to have some effect
(.004) (.004) on giving to kin (negative at low levels of this trait but positive at
Openness squared .002 .002
higher levels). Personality plays a much greater role in giving to the
(.002) (.003)
Agreeableness squared .007 .007 other target groups.
(.004) (.004) Regarding collaborators, neuroticism has a positive effect on giv-
Conscientiousness squared .008** .008** ing (b = .196, p < .10). For extraversion and conscientiousness we
(.002) (.003) find a concave relationship: declining (b = .532, p < .05 and
Neuroticismkin .01
b = .579, p < .01, respectively) then increasing (b = .011, p < .01
(.01)
Extraversionkin .04** and b = .009, p < .01, respectively). We find very similar effects for
(.02) personality in giving to neutrals and competitors. When giving to
Opennesskin .01 neutrals, neuroticism and agreeableness are first positively related
(.01)
to giving (b = .196, p < .05 and b = .399, p < .10, respectively) but
Agreeablenesskin .05**
(.02)
negatively at higher levels of these scores (b = .004, p < .10 and
Conscientiousnesskin .03 b = .008, p < .10, respectively). Extraversion and conscientious-
(.01) ness are first negatively related to giving (b = .438, p < .10 and
Neuroticismcollaborator .00 b = .549, p < .01, respectively) but positively later (b = .009,
(.01)
p < .01 and b = .008, p < .01, respectively). Concerning competitors,
Extraversioncollaborator .02*
(.01) neuroticism is positively related to giving (b = .186, p < .10),
Opennesscollaborator .01 whereas extraversion and conscientiousness are both negatively
(.01) related initially (b = .461, p < .05 and b = .540, p < .01, respec-
Agreeablenesscollaborator .02
tively) but positively at higher levels of these traits (b = .009,
(.01)
Conscientiousnesscollaborator .01
p < .05 and b = .008, p < .01, respectively). In all regressions in
(.01) Table 4, the openness trait shows no association with giving.
Neuroticismcompetitor .01 Cognitive ability and the other variables (gender, age and birth
(.01) order) play no statistically significant role in explaining giving in
Extraversioncompetitor .01
our sample.
(.01)
Opennesscompetitor .02* The results of the non-linear effect of personality on giving to
(.01) persons in each of the four groups are presented in Fig. 2a–d. The
Agreeablenesscompetitor .01 relationships are quite similar across giving to persons in the four
(.01)
categories, although they are weakest for giving to kin.
Conscientiousnesscompetitor .00
(.01)
Constant 2.21 9.25 3.76*
(2.61) (5.71) (1.76)
R-squared .0997 .1404 .1420 4. Discussion

Wald v2 1523.38** 1496.82** 1543.23** Altruism has been studied by psychologists and economists in
N (groups) 13,370 13,370 13,370 (181) different ways. While psychologists generally conceptualize and
(181) (181)
measure altruism broadly, economists focus on monetary altruism.
Note on robustness of classification: we performed the same analyses using a nar- In this paper we follow the call to bring the two disciplines closer
rower classification of persons as kin, collaborators, neutrals, and competitors (Borghans et al., 2008; Frey & Stutzer, 2007) by examining individ-
(therefore fewer observations). This robustness check yielded nearly identical
ual differences in altruistic behavior in the DG in relation to per-
results to the analysis presented above. In all analyses we also control for gender,
age, first-born, youngest child and cognitive ability. None are significant at the .10 sonality and the relationship between the actor and the
level. beneficiary of the altruistic behavior. We suggest that altruistic
a
Model 2 is significantly better than Mode 1 (v2 = 17.28, p < .01). behavior is ‘‘target dependent” and hypothesize that its level is
b
In Model 3 mean centering was used for all the big five personality traits.
c
greater when the target is kin, then a collaborator, then a neutral
Model 3 is significantly better than Model 2 (v2 = 42.16, p < .01).
p < .10.
person, and last and least, a competitor for resources who may
*
p < .05. harm one’s reproductive success. Attitudes towards others are
**
p < .01. likely to be dictated by the way they are classified in the mind of
220 A. Ben-Ner, A. Kramer / Personality and Individual Differences 51 (2011) 216–221

Table 4
Determinants of giving to persons, by category, random-effects GLM regression.

Kina Collaboratorb Neutralc Competitord

Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2
Neuroticism .040 .203 .042 .196 .040 .196* .046 .186
(.034) (.132) (.029) (.112) (.026) (.098) (.026) (.098)
Extraversion .079* .473 .126** .532* .103** .438 .098** .461*
(.039) (.302) (.033) (.255) (.030) (.225) (.030) (.225)
Openness .021 .226 .009 .044 .002 .117 .020 .171
(.034) (.211) (.029) (.178) (.026) (.157) (.026) (.157)
Agreeableness .000 .069 .067 .357 .054 .399 .039 .384
(.042) (.324) (.036) (.274) (.032) (.242) (.032) (.242)
Conscientiousness .006 .237 .017 .579** .027 .549** .022 .540**
(.036) (.244) (.031) (.206) (.028) (.182) (.028) (.182)
Neuroticism2 .004 .004 .004 .003
(.003) (.002) (.002) (.002)
Extraversion2 .009 .011** .009** .009*
(.005) (.004) (.004) (.004)
Openness2 .004 .001 .002 .003
(.004) (.003) (.003) (.003)
Agreeableness2 .001 .007 .008 .007
(.005) (.005) (.004) (.004)
Conscientiousness2 .004 .009** .008** .008**
(.004) (.003) (.003) (.003)
Constant 2.065 8.469 3.274 13.092 2.611 8.881 1.255 7.794
(3.400) (7.704) (2.957) (6.507) (2.613) (5.736) (2.613) (5.741)
R-squared .0246 .0438 .0588 .1020 .0511 .0952 .0610 .1145
Wald v2 7.69 13.79 18.92* 36.00** 18.84* 37.62** 18.92* 37.49**
N (Groups) 724 724 2697 2697 6513 6513 3436 3436
(181) (181) (181) (181) (181) (181) (181) (181)

p < .10.
*
p < .05.
**
p < .01.
a
For kin, Model 2 is not significantly better than Model 1 (v2 = 6.04, p > .05).
b
For collaborator, Model 2 is significantly better than Model 1 (v2 = 15.86, p < .01).
c
For neutral, Model 2 is significantly better than Model 1 (v2 = 17.40, p < .01).
d
For competitor, Model 2 is significantly better than Model 1 (v2 = 17.21, p < .01).

Fig. 2. The means of other variables were used in constructing these graphs. Calculations are based on Table 4, Model 2 random-effects results. (a) Giving to different target
groups by extraversion level. (b) Giving to different target groups by agreeableness level. (c) Giving to different target groups by neuroticism level. (d) Giving to different
target groups by conscientiousness level.
 A. Ben-Ner, A. Kramer / Personality and Individual Differences 51 (2011) 216–221
an individual and therefore altruism can be elicited in the labora-
tory in anonymous one-shot situations.
The data from the DG experiments confirm this hypothesis. We
obtained the anticipated ordering, with differences that are eco-
nomically and statistically highly significant. This four-way classi-
fication constitutes a refinement of the ‘‘us vs. them” or ‘‘in-group
vs. out-group” framework that dominates the literature, and offers
insights into differing altruistic ‘‘impulses.”
We expected that subjects will not show any altruism towards
competitors. Indeed, in nearly 50% of giving opportunities to com-
petitors nothing was actually given; on the other hand, more than
nothing was given in more than half of the cases, for an average of
$1.99. This is only 40% of what is given on average to kin, but is still
more than expected. Several factors may contribute to this. First,
we noted that giving in DG may reflect more than just altruism.
An opportunity to give may be interpreted by some subjects as
an expectation to give some amount of money. We would expect
this effect, if it exists, to be strongest for more agreeable subjects,
but we find that greater agreeableness is associated with lower
giving. Alternatively, subjects who are more neurotic may be more
likely to accede to such an implicit demand; we do find that for a
wide range of scores, more neurotic subjects give more money.
Second, it is possible that some subjects are inequality averse or
fairness prone, so they want to share some of their endowment
with others, even competitors. Finally, our categorization of other
persons may not be shared by all subjects, and some ‘‘other per-
sons” whom we classified as competitors may be perceived by
some subjects as members of other groups. Because subjects could
not give less than nothing, misclassifications of persons into the
competitor group can result only in greater giving to competitors.
However, a robustness check we performed with giving to persons
who can be more narrowly classified yielded essentially identical
results (see note following Table 3).
Our results regarding the role of personality are intriguing. As
expected, we find that personality plays essentially no role in
explaining altruism toward kin. This result is consistent with the
evolutionary view that kin altruism is hard wired and strong, and
therefore few individual differences will be observed in it. How-
ever, in interactions with non-kin where it is less clear how altru-
ism will contribute to the individual’s reproductive success,
personality traits become significant in explaining giving to others
in the categories of collaborator, neutral and competitor. Specifi-
cally, we find a positive-diminishing relationship for neuroticism
and giving, a U-shaped relationship for extraversion and conscien-
tiousness and giving and a positive-diminishing effect for agree-
ableness and giving. Our findings provide further support for the
non-linear relationship between personality and different out-
comes. We find that extraversion has a consistent U-shaped
relationship with altruism. Subjects who were highly introverted
gave a little bit more money than subjects who were a little
introverted, but the relationship becomes positive and strong for
subjects who were at the mean or above the mean of the extraver-
sion scale.
The highest levels of altruism in giving to all target groups are
exhibited by individuals high on neuroticism and extraversion,
and low on conscientiousness and agreeableness. The lowest lev-
els of giving are exhibited by individuals who are emotionally sta-
ble (low on neuroticism), average-low on extraversion, high on
agreeableness and average-low on conscientiousness. These find-
221
ings also highlight the need to consider non-linear effects of per-
sonality by including quadratic terms, which in our sample and
models almost double the variance explained by the model (Table
4, Model 2). Much more work is needed to provide a theoretical
framework for understanding the role of personality in altruistic
behavior.
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