“Do good, feel good” isn’t just a catchphrase — it’s the truth. Recent research by Margaret Echelbarger, a behavioral scientist and assistant professor of marketing at Stony Brook University, highlighted the power of kindness in children.
Published in 2023, the study was conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic and shortly after Echelbarger earned her PhD in psychology at the University of Michigan. She worked alongside Nicholas Epley, a distinguished service professor of behavioral science at the University of Chicago. Together, they looked into prosociality in children, how they perceive simple acts of kindness and how their behavior impacts others.
Echelbarger and Epley’s research was published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology and featured in The Conversation. Echelbarger’s findings were also featured in Time for Kids on Sept. 26.
The experiment took place at the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry where children ranging from ages four to 17 were given two color-changing pencils. Similar to a previous experiment that explored prosociality in adults, the kids were given the option to keep both pencils for themselves or give one pencil to anyone they wanted.
In most cases, the child would gift their pencil to another participant if they chose to give one away. Afterward, one researcher asked the child gifting the pencil what they thought the recipient’s reaction would be. Coincidentally, another researcher found the recipient and asked them the same questions.
“Like adults, children themselves across this age range were also underestimating the positive impact that their random acts of kindness would have on other people,” Echelbarger said. “Not only as a group were they estimating how big of a deal their recipients would report their random act to be, they were also underestimating how positive their recipient would report feeling after receiving the random kindness.”
Initially, Echelbarger found the results of the study surprising. During a 30-minute interview, Echelbarger kept returning to the topic of kindness and prosocial behaviors that many children experience. Using the playground as an example, she pointed out how willing children are to play with other children they may not know or engage with strangers in public.
“I thought, ‘You know what? Maybe children just understand or appreciate that when we do good, it has perhaps a larger impact, or a more positive impact on others than we as adults may think,’” she said. “And I thought maybe better calibrated, that they might have a better sense of just how their kindness is going to be received.”
However, Echelbarger pointed out that compared to the findings of her previous studies, the results of this experiment were similar. Despite the differing experiences between children and adults, the two groups behaved similarly.
Echelbarger’s observations posed a challenge in her studies, but it is a challenge she’s willing to take on. Her background in developmental psychology helps her research as she tries to understand what behaviors change as we age and which ones remain the same. She pointed out how often adults overestimate the awkwardness of a situation, causing them to act with caution when around other people.
“[We’re] so worried about … how we’re going to look when, in fact, the people who are recipients of our prosociality tend to focus on the warmth of our acts,” Echelbarger said. “And so what strikes me as funny is that we are both givers of kindness and recipients of kindness, and how quickly we can forget how wonderful it is to be recipients of kindness.”
Echelbarger said she applied some of the study’s results to her own life. Whether in her personal life or her workplace, she reminds herself of the joy she can spread to others through small acts of kindness.
“It’s just making sure I’m putting myself out there and communicating to my friends and colleagues that, ‘I’m here and I support you, you can rely on me,’” she said.
Echelbarger is turning her focus to a new project with a community partner in the Bronx, N.Y. With the help of Stony Brook students, she will study how caregivers and children facilitate parent-child conversations about money.
“I’ve just been the recipient of such kindness, where now, as a result of the work that I’ve done, and certainly the work of the people around me and beyond, my question is, ‘how can I help people through my research?’” Echelbarger said. “Maybe, like I said, [be] that kinder person they want to be. And so, you know, maybe I’ll have the answer for that someday.”
