Research indicates that spending money on others-prosocial spending-leads to greater happiness than spending money on oneself (e.g., Dunn, Aknin, & Norton, 2008, 2014). These findings have received widespread attention because they offer insight into why people engage in costly prosocial behavior, and what constitutes happier spending more broadly. However, most studies on prosocial spending (like most research on the emotional benefits of generosity) utilized small sample sizes (n < 100/cell). In light of new, improved standards for evidentiary value, we conducted high-powered registered replications of the central paradigms used in prosocial spending research. In Experiment 1, 712 students were randomly assigned to make a purchase for themselves or a stranger in need and then reported their happiness. As predicted, participants assigned to engage in prosocial (vs. personal) spending reported greater momentary happiness. In Experiment 2, 1950 adults recalled a time they spent money on themselves or someone else and then reported their current happiness; contrary to predictions, participants in the prosocial spending condition did not report greater happiness than those in the personal spending condition. Because low levels of task engagement may have produced these null results, we conducted a replication with minor changes designed to increase engagement; in this Experiment 3 (N = 5,199), participants who recalled a prosocial (vs. personal) spending memory reported greater happiness but differences were small. Taken together, these studies support the hypothesis that spending money on others does promote happiness, but demonstrate that the magnitude of the effect depends on several methodological features. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

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在别人身上花钱会促进幸福吗？：注册复制报告。

研究表明，将钱花在他人身上（亲社会的支出）比花在自己身上的钱会带来更大的幸福感（例如，邓恩，阿克宁和诺顿，2008年，2014年）。这些发现得到了广泛的关注，因为它们提供了人们为什么会进行昂贵的亲社会行为以及更广泛的快乐支出构成的见解。但是，大多数有关亲社会支出的研究（如大多数关于慷慨的情感益处的研究）都使用了较小的样本量（n <100 / cell）。鉴于新的，改进的证据价值标准，我们对亲社会支出研究中使用的中心范例进行了功能强大的注册复制。在实验1中，随机分配了712名学生为自己或有需要的陌生人购买东西，然后报告他们的幸福。如预期的那样 被分配从事亲社会（与个人）消费的参与者报告说，他们的瞬间幸福感更大。在实验2中，1950年的成年人回忆起曾经花钱在自己或别人身上，然后报告了自己目前的幸福；与预测相反，亲社会消费条件下的参与者所报告的幸福感不比个人消费条件下的参与者更高。由于较低的任务投入程度可能会产生这些无效的结果，因此我们进行了复制，并进行了一些微小的更改以提高参与度。在本实验3中（N = 5,199），回忆起亲社会（相对于个人）消费记忆的参与者报告了更大的幸福感，但差异很小。综上所述，这些研究支持以下假设：在别人身上花钱确实可以促进幸福，但证明影响的程度取决于几种方法学特征。（PsycInfo数据库记录（c）2020 APA，保留所有权利）。