The Effects of Reinforcement, Punishment and Dependency on Helping Behavior

This field experiment demonstrated that females who were punished for helping in one situation were less likely to help on a subsequent occasion than were females who were reinforced for having helped. In addition, subjects helped a high-dependent person more often than they did the low-dependent person. While subjects usually helped directly, this was less likely to occur for those subjects who were punished for having helped and then were confronted with a low-dependent person. The results were interpreted from a cost-reward model of helping behavior.