Power hierarchies are ubiquitous, emerging formally and informally, in both personal and professional contexts. When prosocial acts are offered within power hierarchies, there is a widespread belief that people who choose lower-power beneficiaries are altruistically motivated, and that those who choose higher-power beneficiaries hold a self-interested motive to ingratiate. In contrast, the current research empirically demonstrates that people can also choose lower-power beneficiaries for self-interested reasons – namely, to bolster their own moral reputation in the group. Across three pre-registered studies, involving different contexts and types of prosocial behavior, and including real financial incentives, we demonstrate that people are more likely to choose lower-power beneficiaries when reputation concerns are more salient. We also provide evidence of the mechanism underlying this pattern: people believe that choosing a lower-power beneficiary more effectively signals their own moral character.

在个人和专业环境中，权力等级制度无处不在，正式和非正式地出现。当在权力等级制度中提供亲社会行为时，人们普遍认为选择低权力受益者的人是出于利他主义动机，而选择高权力受益者的人则出于自利动机去讨好。相比之下，目前的研究从经验上表明，人们也可以出于自利的原因选择权力较低的受益者——即提升自己在群体中的道德声誉。在三项预注册研究中，涉及不同背景和类型的亲社会行为，包括真正的经济激励，我们证明，当声誉问题更加突出时，人们更有可能选择权力较低的受益人。