Reflection on prosocial experiences may be helpful for adolescents highly attentive to their internal states (i.e., high private self-consciousness) to gain prosocial self-knowledge, yet adolescents with low private self-consciousness may not benefit from it. The current study proposed and examined that engaging in helping behavior would be beneficial for those with low private self-consciousness in self-understanding. Two experimental studies using immersive virtual environment technology were conducted to simulate helping situations. A total of 140 middle school students (n = 59, 47.5% female, M_age = 13.98, SD = 0.89, in Study 1; n = 81, 44.4% female, M_age = 15.31, SD = 1.18, in Study 2) completed the experiments. In both studies, adolescents engaging in helping behaviors identified themselves as more prosocial than those who did not engage in helping behaviors. In Study 2, adolescents’ positive prosocial self-concept would increase more through engaging in prosocial behavior than by reflecting on past prosocial experiences. Furthermore, adolescents with high private self-consciousness can gain self-understanding both from self-reflection and engaging in prosocial behavior, whereas adolescents with low private self-consciousness benefit only from engaging in prosocial behavior. The findings suggest the need to consider individual differences and adopt appropriate ways of self-understanding when assisting adolescents’ prosocial self-formation.

对亲社会经历的反思可能有助于高度关注其内部状态（即高度的私人自我意识）的青少年获得亲社会的自我认识，但私人自我意识低的青少年可能无法从中受益。目前的研究提出并检验了参与帮助行为将有益于那些在自我理解中的私人自我意识低的人。使用沉浸式虚拟环境技术进行了两项实验研究，以模拟帮助情况。共有 140 名中学生（n  = 59，47.5% 女性，M_年龄 = 13.98，SD  = 0.89，在研究 1 中；n  = 81，44.4% 女性，M_年龄 = 15.31，SD = 1.18，在研究 2) 中完成了实验。在这两项研究中，参与帮助行为的青少年认为自己比不参与帮助行为的青少年更亲社会。在研究 2 中，青少年积极的亲社会自我概念会更多地通过参与亲社会行为而不是通过反思过去的亲社会经历来增加。此外，具有高度私人自我意识的青少年可以通过自我反省和参与亲社会行为来获得自我理解，而私人自我意识低的青少年只能从参与亲社会行为中受益。研究结果表明，在帮助青少年亲社会自我形成时，需要考虑个体差异并采取适当的自我理解方式。