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Society Shapes Helping Behavior
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Human beings are social animals who have always helped each other (and, of course, also hurt each other). The kind of relationships that a society expects from its citizens and the way it organizes its important institutions—the family, the system of governance and control—can either nurture or stunt people’s impulses to give help to relatives, friends, and needy strangers.
Anthropologists have shown that behavior varies widely among cultures. It is shaped by the food supply, the kinship system, the system of production, and relationships with other societies. It is easier to be loving and helpful in some societies than in others. Yet, if a modern society is to stay intact, it must encourage some form of mutual help. This is what the anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss (1974) called the principle of reciprocity, which he considered the basic glue that holds together a society. That principle points to people’s mutual obligations toward each other, based on caring and a sense of justice.
