Why Altruism Is Impossible ... and Ubiquitous

Deeply held commitments to individualism, atomism, and egoism have moved psychology to underestimate the frequency and significance of altruism and to seek explanations of examples of altruism that are based in the self-interested motives of the altruists. In this article, I review evidence that altruism is pervasive and discuss the conditions that promote its development in children and its display in adults. However, I suggest that there is nothing natural or inevitable about the pervasiveness of altruism-that large-scale cultural influences that regulate social relations and contribute to establishing the boundaries between self and other can have profound effects on altruism. The contemporary United States, with its emphasis on market relations between free and autonomous individuals, exemplifies the cultural conditions least conducive to altruism.