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Cited by 413

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 17 of the 17 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

The Social Dimension of Stress Reactivity: Acute Stress Increases Prosocial Behavior in Humans

von Dawans, Bernadette, Fischbacher, Urs, Kirschbaum, Clemens, Fehr, Ernst, Heinrichs, Markus·2012·Psychological Science

Abstract

Psychosocial stress precipitates a wide spectrum of diseases with major public-health significance. The fight-or-flight response is generally regarded as the prototypic human stress response, both physiologically and behaviorally. Given that having positive social interactions before being exposed to acute stress plays a preeminent role in helping individuals control their stress response, engaging in prosocial behavior in response to stress (tend-and-befriend) might also be a protective pattern. Little is known, however, about the immediate social responses following stress in humans. Here we show that participants who experienced acute social stress, induced by a standardized laboratory stressor, engaged in substantially more prosocial behavior (trust, trustworthiness, and sharing) compared with participants in a control condition, who did not experience socioevaluative threat. These effects were highly specific: Stress did not affect the readiness to exhibit antisocial behavior or to bear nonsocial risks. These results show that stress triggers social approach behavior, which operates as a potent stress-buffering strategy in humans, thereby providing evidence for the tend-and-befriend hypothesis.

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Metadata

Authors
von Dawans, B., Fischbacher, U., Kirschbaum, C., Fehr, E., & Heinrichs, M.
Venue
Psychological Science
Published
2012-05-16
Volume
23
Issue
6
Pages
651-660
ISSN
  • 0956-7976 (ISSN-L)
  • 1467-9280
OpenAlex
W2138258215
Cited by
413
References
17
FWCI
5.99
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed

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CoChat. (2026). Citation check: The Social Dimension of Stress Reactivity: Acute Stress Increases Prosocial Behavior in Humans. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1177/0956797611431576
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von Dawans, B., Fischbacher, U., Kirschbaum, C., Fehr, E., & Heinrichs, M. (2012). The Social Dimension of Stress Reactivity: Acute Stress Increases Prosocial Behavior in Humans. Psychological Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797611431576

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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).

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