Psychological barriers to effective altruism
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Ineffective Altruism
Ineffective altruism is the practice of ineffective giving.[1] It contrasts with effective altruism, which is defined as "a philosophy and social movement that advocates using the most effective, evidence-based strategies to benefit others."[1]
Background
Talk about the evolutionary approach.[2]
Talk about effective altruism.
Talk about the significance of charitable giving globally.
The Paradox of Ineffective Giving
We are motivated to give, but not motivated to give effectively.[2]
Obstacles to Effective Giving
Motivational Obstacles
Subjectivity
People often prioritize giving to charities that align with their subjectively preferred causes.[3] Commonly, people believe charity to be a subjective decision which should not be motivated by numbers, but by care for the cause. This aligns with the theory of warm-glow giving originally proposed by the economist James Andreoni. According to Andreoni (1990), individuals gain satisfaction from the act of giving but are not concerned about the benefits generated by their act.[4][3]
Narrow Moral Circle
Scope Neglect (Insensitivity)
Scope neglect (or scope insensitivity) is the idea that people are numb to the number of victims in large, high-stake humanitarian situations.[5][6] Some research has compared this cognitive bias to the economic concept of diminishing marginal utility wherein people demonstrate a decreasing non-linear concern for individuals as the number of people increases.[6]
Epistemic Obstacles
Overhead Aversion
References
- ^ a b Caviola, Lucius; Schubert, Stefan; Greene, Joshua D. (July 2021). "The Psychology of (In)Effective Altruism". Trends in Cognitive Sciences. 25 (7): 596–607. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2021.03.015. ISSN 1364-6613.
- ^ a b Burum, Bethany; Nowak, Martin A.; Hoffman, Moshe (December 2020). "An evolutionary explanation for ineffective altruism". Nature Human Behaviour. 4 (12): 1245–1257. doi:10.1038/s41562-020-00950-4. ISSN 2397-3374.
- ^ a b Berman, Jonathan Z.; Barasch, Alixandra; Levine, Emma E.; Small, Deborah A. (May 2018). "Impediments to Effective Altruism: The Role of Subjective Preferences in Charitable Giving". Psychological Science. 29 (5): 834–844. doi:10.1177/0956797617747648. ISSN 0956-7976 – via Association for Psychological Science.
- ^ Andreoni, James (1990). "Impure altruism and donations to public goods: A theory of warm-glow giving". The Economic Journal. 100 (401): 464–477.
- ^ Yudkowsky, Eliezer (13 May 2007). "Scope Insensitivity". lesswrong.com. Retrieved 16 October 2023.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ a b Dickert, Stephan; Västfjäll, Daniel; Kleber, Janet; Slovic, Paul (September 2015). "Scope insensitivity: The limits of intuitive valuation of human lives in public policy". Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition. 4 (3): 248–255. doi:10.1016/j.jarmac.2014.09.002. ISSN 2211-369X.