| Summary: | Long-term thinking and voluntary resource sharing are two
distinctive traits of human nature. Across three experiments (N=1,082), I
propose a causal connection: Sometimes people are generous because they think
about the future. Participants were randomly assigned to either focus on the
present or the future and then made specific decisions in hypothetical
scenarios. In Study 1 (N=200), future-focused participants shared more money in
a public dictator game than present-focused participants (+39%), and they were
willing to donate more money to charity (+61%). Study 2 (N=410) replicated the
positive effect of future-focus on dictator giving when the choice was framed
as public (+36%), but found no such effect when the choice was framed as
private. That is, focusing on the future made participants more generous only
when others would know their identity. Study 3 was a high-powered and
pre-registered replication of Study 1 (N=472), including a few extensions. Once
again, future-focused participants gave more money to charity in a public
donation scenario (+40%), and they were more likely to volunteer for the same
charity (+17%). As predicted, the effect was mediated by reputational concern,
indicating that future-orientation can make people more generous because it
also makes them more attuned to the social consequences of their choices.
Taken together, the results suggest that focusing on the future promotes
reputation-based generosity. By stimulating voluntary resource sharing, a
central function of human foresight might be to support cooperation in groups
and society.
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