By engaging in corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities, companies can not only generate favorable stakeholder attitudes and better support behaviors (e.g. purchase, seeking employment, investing in the company), but also, over the long run, build corporate image, strengthen stakeholder–company relationships, and enhance stakeholders' advocacy behaviors. However, stakeholders' low awareness of and unfavorable attributions towards companies' CSR activities remain critical impediments in companies' attempts to maximize business benefits from their CSR activities, highlighting a need for companies to communicate CSR more effectively to stakeholders. In light of these challenges, a conceptual framework of CSR communication is presented and its different aspects are analyzed, from message content and communication channels to company- and stakeholder-specific factors that influence the effectiveness of CSR communication.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm?abstractid=1537407

Maximizing Business Returns to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR): The Role of CSR Communication

Why do people purchase proenvironmental "green" products? We argue that buying such products can be construed as altruistic, since green products often cost more and are of lower quality than their conventional counterparts, but green goods benefit the environment for everyone. Because biologists have observed that altruism might function as a "costly signal" associated with status, we examined in 3 experiments how status motives influenced desire for green products. Activating status motives led people to choose green products over more luxurious nongreen products. Supporting the notion that altruism signals one's willingness and ability to incur costs for others' benefit, status motives increased desire for green products when shopping in public (but not private) and when green products cost more (but not less) than nongreen products. Findings suggest that status competition can be used to promote proenvironmental behavior.

Going green to be seen: Status, reputation, and conspicuous conservation.

Current research on prosocial behavior covers a broad and diverse range of phenomena. We argue that this large research literature can be best organized and understood from a multilevel perspective. We identify three levels of analysis of prosocial behavior: (a) the “meso” level—the study of helper-recipient dyads in the context of a specific situation; (b) the micro level—the study of the origins of prosocial tendencies and the sources of variation in these tendencies; and (c) the macro level—the study of prosocial actions that occur within the context of groups and large organizations. We present research at each level and discuss similarities and differences across levels. Finally, we consider ways in which theory and research at these three levels of analysis might be combined in future intra- and interdisciplinary research on prosocial behavior.

https://www2.psych.ubc.ca/~schaller/Psyc591Readings/PennerDovidioPiliavinSchroeder2005.pdf

Prosocial Behavior: Multilevel Perspectives

1 Front Matter 2 1 The Drama of the Commons 3 Part I: Resource Users, Resource Systems, and Behavior in the Drama of the Commons 4 2 Common Resources and Institutional Sustainability 5 3 Unequal Irrigators: Heterogeneity and Commons Management in Large-Scale 6 4 Factors Influencing Cooperation in Commons Dilemmas: A Review of Experimental Psychological Research 7 5 Appropriating the Commons: A Theoretical Explanation 8 Part II: Privatization and Its Limitations 9 6 The Tradable Permits Approach to Protecting the Commons: What Have We Learned? 10 7 Common Property, Regulatory Property, and Environmental Protection: Comparing Community-Based Management to Tradable Environmental Allowances 11 Part III: Cross-Scale Linkages and Dynamic Interactions 12 8 Institutional Interplay: The Environmental Consequences of Cross-Scale Interactions 13 9 Cross-Scale Institutional Linkages: Perspectives from the Bottom Up 14 Part IV: Emerging Issues 15 10 Scientific Uncertainty, Complex Systems, and the Design of Common-Pool Institutions 16 11 Emergence of Institutions for the Commons: Contexts, Situations, and Events 17 12 An Evolutionary Theory of Commons Management 18 13 Knowledge and Questions After 15 Years of Research 19 About the Contributors 20 Index

The Drama of the Commons

The structure of environmental concern: concern for self, other people, and the biosphere

The authors adopt an interdependen ce analysis of social value orientation, proposing that prosocial, individualistic, and competitive orientations are (a) partially rooted in different patterns of social interaction as experienced during the periods spanning early childhood to young adulthood and (b) further shaped by different patterns of social interaction as experienced during early adulthood, middle adulthood, and old age. Congruent with this analysis, results revealed that relative to individualists and competitors, prosocial individuals exhibited greater levels of secure attachment (Studies 1 and 2) and reported having more siblings, especially sisters (Study 3). Finally, the prevalence of prosocials increased—and the prevalence of individualist s and competitors decreased—from early adulthood to middle adulthood and old age (Study 4). Traditional theories and insights assume that the principle of rational self-interest or economic man reflects the prevailing motivation among humankind (Luce & Raiffa, 1957; Von Neuman & Morgenstern, 1947; cf. Roth, 1988). However, more recent theoretical developments have indicated that individuals systematically differ in the manner in which they approach interdependent others. Some people are inclined to give interdependent others the benefit of the doubt and approach them cooperatively, whereas other people are inclined to approach interdependent others in a less cooperative manner. Such individual differences are related to social value orientation, defined as stable preferences for certain patterns of outcomes for oneself and others (McClintock, 1978; Messick & McClintock, 1968). Although a variety of different social value orientations can be distinguished from a theoretical point of view (e.g., Knight & Dubro, 1984), in this article we address a three-category typology of social value orientation, examining differences between prosocial, individualistic, and competitive orientations. Prosocials tend to maximize outcomes for both themselves and others (i.e., cooperation) and to minimize differences between outcomes for

/pdf/development-of-prosocial-individualistic-and-competitive-4b3netrb9q.pdf

E.M.N. de Bruin

Papers

Development of prosocial, individualistic, and competitive orientations : Theory and preliminary evidence