Helping strangers has a beneficial effect on the psychological state of Russians. This was reported by the press service of the National Research University Higher School of Economics .
Psychologists have long noticed that the desire to help other people not only produces benefits for those in need, but also increases the subjective comfort of those who help. A study conducted by Ekaterina Nastina from the Ronald Franklin Inglehart Laboratory for Comparative Social Research at the National Research University Higher School of Economics showed that this opinion is confirmed by opinion polls among Russians.
The study sample consisted of 757 people aged 20 to 75 years. The questionnaire included questions about helping other people, as well as an Ed Diener Life Satisfaction Test . “The average value in the first case was 3.66 on a five-point scale, while 55% of respondents chose the values 4 (“often”) or 5 (“very often”). At the same time, the average frequency of helping strangers is at the level of 2.72. Often or very often, only 15% of beneficiaries who help this category turned out to be,” says Ekaterina Nastina.
Data analysis showed that those who help others more often are more satisfied with their lives. This applies to both men and women. At the same time, the effect of helping relatives turned out to be more pronounced than the effect of helping strangers, but these differences cannot be called significant. Moreover, in none of the cases was there evidence that life satisfaction is lowered if help is provided too often. Moreover, the younger the person, the more satisfaction he receives on average from helping strangers. Probably, helping behavior is especially important when a person is looking for his place in life and is at the stage of formation as an adult.
