psychology

A few weeks ago I spoke at a screening of “The End of Suburbia” (see previous post). I felt it was, in general, a positive first experience at speaking on Peak Oil, but I did learn a few things about how to introduce the topic to people.

LiveScience published another interesting article on the human mind's interaction with money. From the article:

Research has shown that people become emotionally distressed when confronted with inequality. The privileged minority is particularly affected, and they are likely to have a nagging worry that their cash and prizes are undeserved.

To keep a clean conscience and legitimize privilege, individuals often alter their perceptions of the status quo.

The details of how that mental distortion provides the relief, however, remained a mystery until now.

and

“We assume that people care about justice, at least to some degree, and are bothered by potential departures from fairness,” the scientists wrote in a report of their work published in the current issue of the journal Psychological Science. “In order to maintain their perceptions of the world as just, however, people do not necessarily strive to make changes that will increase the overall amount of fairness and equality in the system.”

So it appears that even the most altruistic among those with wealth might not have the ability to feel compassion for those without. In the case of the environment or Peak Oil, this research could shed some light on why it is so difficult for many people to grasp the idea that their actions are unfairly hurting future generations -- even their own progeny. If wealth blinds us to seeing the damage we cause to the less fortunate (in this case our own children), how can we tailor our message on these issues to elicit a more positive response?

For that matter, how do we establish an economic or social system within a community to get around this human tendency?

An article at LiveScience today discussed the results of a study showing that even thinking about money can lead to a reduction in selfless behaviors, even when the selfless activity has nothing to do with competition for wealth. It's unfortunate that we're wired this way, but it's something to consider when trying to build community. How can we encourage our neighbors to emphasize cooperation over competition?