Feeling Good, Doing Good, and Getting Ahead: A Meta-Analytic Investigation of the Outcomes of Prosocial Motivation at Work

In recent years, a rapidly growing literature has shed light on important costs and benefits of prosocial motivation in the workplace. However, researchers have studied prosocial motivation using various labels, conceptualizations, and operationalizations, leaving this body of knowledge fragmented. In this study, we contribute to the literature by providing an integrated framework that organizes extant constructs and measures of prosocial motives along two dimensions: level of autonomy (discretionary/obligatory) and level of generality (global/contextual/positional). Drawing upon this framework, we conducted a meta-analysis with 252 samples and 666 effect sizes to examine the effects of prosocial motivation on workplace outcomes. Moderator analyses were performed to resolve inconsistencies in the empirical literature and understand the context under which prosocial motivation had the strongest or weakest effect. We found that prosocial motivation, in general, was beneficial for employee well-being (𝜌̅ = .23), prosocial behavior (𝜌̅ = .35), job performance (𝜌̅ = .20), and career success (𝜌̅ = .06). The direction and magnitude of these effects depended on the autonomy, generality, and measurement of prosocial motivation, the nature of the outcome (i.e., type of prosocial behavior, subjectivity of performance measures, and forms of career success), as well as the cultural context. Importantly, prosocial motivation had incremental validity above and beyond general cognitive ability and Big Five personality traits for predicting all four outcomes. We discuss the theoretical, methodological, and practical implications from these findings and offer a guiding framework for future research efforts.