No |
SDES-2016-11 |
Title |
Generativity and social value orientation between rural and urban societies |
Author |
Raja Timilsina, Koji Kotani and Yoshio Kamijo |
Abstract |
Generativity, concern and commitment for the next generation, is one important factor for
sustainable development of a society, since intergenerational sustainability is claimed to have
been compromised over the last decades. Generativity emerges through both prosocial and proself
behaviors characterized by social preference, and is now hypothesized to decrease in some modern
societies called "generativity crisis." However, little is known about how ongoing modernization
of competitive societies, i.e., capitalism, and social preferences affect generativity. To this end,
we conduct field experiments of the social value orientation and the generative behavior checklist
in the two fields of Nepalese societies: (1) urban and (2) rural areas. The analysis finds that
prosociality and the rural-specific effect are the two major factors that positively affect people’s
generativity, while a larger proportion of prosocial people are found in rural areas than in urban
areas. Overall, these results suggest that generativity shall decrease with further modernization
of societies that changes the economic culture and people’s orientation to be less concerned for
future generation. |
Revised version published in |
Futures |