This exploratory study tries to interpret the results of a test of altruism among almost 200 children from four small-scale societies in Belize, Kenya, Nepal, and American Samoa. Samoan children and, to a lesser extent, Nepalese Newar children were altruistic in a dictator game test. We considered evidence that the four settlements varied according to a collectivistic dimension and that such collectivism may have strongly influenced responses to the test. Not only did test results correspond fully to degree of community collectivism across the four cultures (rank-order correlation coefficient = 1.00, p < .05, N = 4), but Samoan children also scored at the highest level across each age group from 3 to 9 years of age, and the Nepalese Newar participants scored at the second highest level at all ages. We posit that social and material conditions in Samoa and Nepal were likely sources of collectivism and, concomitantly, the strong altruistic tendencies but acknowledge that in exploratory research there will always be issues concerning interpretation.

中文翻译：

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利他主义与集体主义：四种文化的探索性研究

这项探索性研究试图解释来自伯利兹、肯尼亚、尼泊尔和美属萨摩亚的四个小规模社会的近 200 名儿童的利他主义测试结果。萨摩亚儿童以及在较小程度上的尼泊尔纽瓦尔儿童在独裁者游戏测试中表现出利他主义。我们考虑了四个定居点根据集体主义维度而变化的证据，并且这种集体主义可能强烈影响了对测试的反应。测试结果不仅与四种文化的社区集体主义程度完全对应（等级相关系数 = 1.00，p < .05，N = 4），而且萨摩亚儿童在每个年龄组中的得分也最高，从 3到 9 岁，尼泊尔尼瓦尔参与者的得分在所有年龄段中排名第二。