The Arithmetic of Compassion: Confronting the Challenge of Pseudoinefficacy in Charitable Giving

在很多情况下，当我们被要求帮助生命受到威胁的人时，我们不可能帮助每一个人。然后我们做什么？研究表明，人们在帮助那些他们可以帮助的人时往往感觉不那么好，当他们的注意力被吸引到那些无法帮助的人时，他们会减少帮助。这些人表现出的失动力可能是一种非理性的伪无能。我们不应该因为有些人我们无法帮助，就不去帮助我们所能帮助的人。本研究旨在更好地理解假无效的认知和情感基础，以及对抗它的测试策略。具体来说，研究小组在决定是否帮助生命受到威胁的人的情况下检查了伪无效。实验室实验和在线调查阐明了人道主义需求的范围和框架、它所激发的思维类型以及与这种思维和伪无效相关的独特情绪反应之间的相互作用。这个项目的重要性在于，在国内和国际上，数以百万计的人在贫困、疾病、粮食不足、自然灾害和人类的恶意面前挣扎求生。那些有幸有能力和愿望去帮助那些需要帮助的人的个人和政府都被要求提供重要援助的请求淹没了。许多人确实做出了回应。个人、非政府组织和政府提供的人道主义援助，虽然在某种意义上很大，但只是需要和可以提供的一小部分。对于那些有能力提供帮助的人来说，做出决定的强烈动机是感知到的效力。无论是真实的还是感知到的无能为力，都会使人们的反应萎缩，即使是那些有保护和改善生活的愿望和手段的人也是如此。由于研究小组称之为“伪无效”的“无效幻觉”，功效得不到认可，可以提供的重要援助被拒绝，这确实是一种悲剧。本研究项目探索并记录了假无效的根本心理原因，并开发了减轻其有害后果的方法。虽然拟议的研究是在人道主义援助的背景下进行的，但伪无效的问题是广泛的个人和社会决策的核心，这些决策是由感知到的有效性所驱动的，例如采取行动减缓气候变化或对人类健康和环境的其他威胁。

In a great many situations where we are asked to aid persons whose lives are endangered, we are not able to help everyone. What do we then do? Research has shown that people often feel less good about helping those they can help and they help less when their attention is drawn to those who cannot be helped. The demotivation exhibited by these people may be a form of pseudoinefficacy that is nonrational. We should not be deterred from helping whomever we can because there are others we are not able to help. This research aims to provide a better understanding of the cognitive and emotional underpinnings of pseudoinefficacy and test strategies to combat it. Specifically, the research team examines pseudoinefficacy in the context of decisions about whether to aid people whose lives are endangered. Laboratory experiments and online surveys illuminate the interplay between the scope and framing of the humanitarian need, the type of thinking it stimulates, and the distinct emotional responses associated with such thinking and with pseudoinefficacy.The importance of this project comes from the fact that, domestically and internationally, millions of people struggle to survive in the face of poverty, disease, food insufficiency, natural disasters, and human malevolence. Those individuals and governments fortunate to have the ability and desire to help those in need are inundated with requests for vital aid. Many do respond. Humanitarian aid provided by individuals, NGOs, and governments, though large in some sense, is but a fraction of what is needed and what could be provided. For those in a position to help, decisions are strongly motivated by perceived efficacy. Inefficacy, real or perceived, shrivels response, even among those who have the desire and the means to protect and improve lives. It is tragic, indeed, when efficacy goes unrecognized and vital aid that could be provided is withheld due to the illusion of ineffectiveness that the research teams has labelled "pseudoinefficacy." This research projecct explores and documents the root psychological causes of pseudoinefficacy and develops ways to mitigate its harmful consequences. Although the proposed studies are set in the context of humanitarian aid, the problem of pseudoinefficacy is central to a wide range of important personal and societal decisions motivated by perceived efficacy, such as actions to mitigate climate change or other threats to human health and the environment.