Two threats to the common good: Self-interested egoism and empathy-inducedaltruism

In each of two experiments, some participants chose between allocation of r esources to the group as a whole or to themselves alone (egoism condition); some chose between allocation to a group or to a group member for whom the y were induced to feel empathy (altruism condition); and some chose between allocation to a group or to a member for whom empathy was not induced (bas eline condition). When the decision was private, allocation to the group wa s significantly-and similarly-lower in the egoism and altruism conditions c ompared to the baseline. When the decision was public, allocation to the gr oup was significantly lower only in the altruism condition. These results i ndicated, first, that both egoism and altruism can be potent threats to the common good and, second, that anticipated social evaluation is a powerful inhibitor of the egoistic but not the altruistic threat.