| Pay It Forward The expression "pay it forward" is used by a creditor who offers the debtor the option of paying the debt forward to a third person instead of paying it back. Debt and payments can be monetary or by good deeds. In sociology, this concept is called "serial reciprocity". A related transaction, which starts with a gift instead of a loan, is alternative giving. In 2000, Catherine Ryan Hyde's novel Pay It Forward was published and adapted into a Warner Brothers film, Pay It Forward. In Ryan Hyde's book and movie it is described as an obligation to do three good deeds for others in repayment of a good deed that one receives. Such good deeds should be things that the other person cannot accomplish on their own. In this way, the need to help one another can spread exponentially through society, creating a social movement with the goal of making the world a better place. The idea of the book has been championed in real life by the Pay It Forward Foundation. The Foundation focuses on bringing the idea of paying it forward to school age children, parents, and educators. The simple idea of doing good works for others to repay the good that has happened to you is one that can easily be conveyed to children and encourages them to be socially aware and take a role in making the world a better place. The main character of the book was a 12-year-old child, thus giving other children someone they can relate to. In October 2005, Syracuse University's Residence Hall Association began a Pay It Forward campaign on campus. It spread on campus rapidly, and was noted for entering mainstream Syracuse society as a result. Many other schools have now begun campaigns such as this as well. On October 26, 2006 Oprah gave her audience a challenge to Pay it Forward, giving 300 audience guests $1,000 USD on a debit card and a camcorder to record the acts of kindness they did. The rules of the challenge were very specific, the money had to be spent within one week and could only be used to help charitable organizations or an individual person but not a relative. Social psychology, Reciprocity refers to responding to a positive action with another positive action, and responding to a negative action with another negative one. Positive reciprocal actions differ from altruistic actions as they only follow from other positive actions and they differ from social gift giving in that they are not actions taken with the hope or expectation of future positive responses.Reciprocal actions are important to social psychology as they can help explain the maintenance of social norms. If a sufficient proportion of the population interprets the breaking of a social norm by another as a hostile action and if these people are willing to take (potentially costly) action to punish the rule-breaker then this can maintain the norm in the absence of formal sanctions. The punishing action may range from negative words to complete social ostracism. In public good experiments, behavioral economists have demonstrated that the potential for reciprocal actions by players increases the rate of contribution to the public good, providing evidence for the importance of reciprocity in social situations (Fehr and Gatcher, 2003). In mathematics, game theory describes reciprocity as a highly effective Tit for Tat strategy for the iterated prisoner's dilemma. In the animal world reciprocity exists in the social behaviour of Baboons. Male Baboons will form alliances with one another in order that one baboon will distract the Alpha-male, who has monoplized reproductive females, and the other will copulate with a female. The roles will be reversed later for "payback." Pay It Forward Movie Pay It Forward Foundation Pay It Forward Movement Pay It Forward |