PERCEIVED COMPETITION IN SCHOOLS, COMPETITIVE ORIENTATIONS, EMPATHY, AND PROSOCIALNESS

Abstract

Empathy is an important predictor of prosocial behaviours and positive relationships, but negatively associated with bullying. In contrast, competitive contexts are related to counterempathetic responses and poor peer relationships in schools. Using 206 responses to self-report questionnaires from undergraduates in Singapore, this study examined how competition during secondary school might negatively impact prosocialness via lower empathy. Through mediation analysis, this study found that competitive school contexts instead predicted higher prosocialness via greater empathy. The results imply distinctions between state and trait empathy, and competition and cooperation may be independent constructs. Future research should investigate competitive school contexts' possible positive long-term impacts on empathy and prosocialness. Individual’s hypercompetitive attitudes also contribute to lower perspective-taking and more bullying. In the second part of this study, individual’s collectivistic orientation was hypothesised to predict higher prosocialness via lower hypercompetitiveness and greater empathy. This study did not find the proposed serial mediation but found a simple mediation effect of empathy on the relationship between individual’s individualism–collectivism orientation and prosocialness. The effect of hypercompetitiveness was likely insignificant due to range restriction error. The results are consistent with the literature that collectivists tend to be less hypercompetitive, and higher collectivism predicts more prosocialness via greater empathy.