Social mindfulness predicts concern for nature and immigrants across 36 nations

People cooperate every day in ways that range from largescale contributions that mitigate climate change to simple actions such as leaving another individual with choice – known as social mindfulness. It is not yet clear whether and how these complex and more simple forms of cooperation relate. Prior work has found that countries with individuals who made more socially mindful choices were linked to a higher country environmental performance – a proxy for complex cooperation. Here we replicated this initial finding in 41 samples around the world, demonstrating the robustness of the association between social mindfulness and environmental performance, and substantially built on it to show this relationship extended to a wide range of complex cooperative indices, tied closely to many current societal issues. We found that greater social mindfulness expressed by an individual was related to living in countries with more social capital, more community participation and reduced prejudice towards immigrants. Our findings speak to the symbiotic relationship between simple and more complex forms of cooperation in societies.

The task you are about to do involves two people; you and someone else. Imagine that the other person is someone you haven't met before, and will not knowingly meet again in the future (because you will not get to know or see each other in person).
Also imagine that you both get to choose one of the objects that are shown on the paper. There are only a few objects left. Once taken, these will not be replaced. In this task, you always get to choose first. You will have to make several choices.

So to summarize:
You and someone else can each choose one among the products shown on the paper.

It is important to remember that you always choose first!
è Make your choice by circling the number under the product you would like to take.
First, here's an example. Which of these objects would you take? You pick first, then the other! 1 2 3 Now turn the page to start the task.
Remember that there's two of you, and that you always choose first! Which of these objects would you take? You pick first, then the other person! Responses were recorded on a scale from 1 (completely disagree) to 7 (completely agree) and an average score for all items was calculated.

Economic conservatism
• Please indicate your political beliefs from left/liberal to right/conservative on issues of the economy (e.g., social welfare, government spending, tax cuts): Responses were recorded on a scale from 1 (left/liberal) to 7 (right/conservative).

Social conservatism
• Please indicate your political beliefs from left/liberal to right/conservative on social issues (e.g., immigration, homosexual marriage, abortion): Responses were recorded on a scale from 1 (left/liberal) to 7 (right/conservative) MacArthur Scale of Subjective Socioeconomic Status 3 • Think of this ladder as representing where people stand in <country>. At the top of the ladder are the people who have the most money, most education, and most respected jobs. At the bottom are the people who have the least money, least education, and least respected jobs or no job. The higher up you are on this ladder, the closer you are to the people at the very top, and the lower you are, the closer you are to the people at the very bottom. Where would you place yourself on this ladder? Please select a number corresponding to the rung where you think you stand at this time in your life, relative to other people in <country>.
Responses were recorded on a scale from 1 (least money, job prestige and education) to 10 (most money, job prestige and education) People sometimes talk about 'circles of moral concern'. These circles are simple ways to make sense of the levels of moral consideration we have for different entities (e.g., people, animals, and the environment).
Where we place these entities within our moral circles is important and has direct consequences for how we treat them. For example, you might have close family or friends that are central to your moral world, this means you would be willing to make personal sacrifices for them. However, if we do not include an entity within our moral circles, this means we do not believe they are deserving of moral care and consideration, and wouldn't want to make sacrifices for them.
On the following page you are given the opportunity to organise a range of entities and place them within your own moral circles that reflect your individual views and feelings.
Please read the four moral boundary descriptions below before completing the moral circle task.
• Inner Circle of Moral Concern: These entities deserve the highest level of moral concern and standing. You have a moral obligation to ensure their welfare and feel a sense of personal responsibility for their treatment.
• Outer Circle of Moral Concern: These entities deserve moderate moral concern and standing. You are concerned about their moral treatment; however, your sense of obligation and personal responsibility is greatly reduced.
• Fringes of Moral Concern: These entities deserve minimal moral concern and standing, but you are not morally obligated or personally responsible for their moral treatment.
• Outside the Moral Boundary: These entities deserve no moral concern or standing. Feeling concern or personal responsibility for their moral treatment is extreme or nonsensical.
Having carefully read these descriptions, please consider the level of moral concern you have for each of the entities below and select the appropriate moral circle placement. Responses are coded as 3 (inner circle of moral concern), 2 (outer circle of moral concern), 1 (fringes of moral concern) or 0 (outside the moral boundary).
Responses to each entity are added together to create a total moral expansiveness score between 0 (least morally expansive) to 90 (most morally expansive).
Attitudes towards immigrants 16 1. Immigrants take resources and employment opportunities away from <Country> 2. In schools where there are too many children of immigrants, the quality of education will suffer 3. Immigrants abuse the system of social benefits 4. <Country> norms and values are being threatened by the presence of immigrants 5. The cultural practices of immigrants threaten the <Country> way of life 6. Immigrants are a threat to the <Country> identity Responses were recorded on a scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree) and an average score for all items was calculated.

Schwartz 'Universalism' Value 17
The next questionnaire asks about the things you personally value in life. Please answer in the space to the left of each item. First read the list of values below and choose the value that is most important to you and rate it 7. Next, choose the value that is opposed to what you value and rate it -1. If there is no such value, choose the value least important to you and rate it 0 or 1, according to its importance. Then rate the rest of the values in the list: • Universalism, that is, equality, a world at peace, wisdom, social justice, broadmindedness, to enjoy the beauty of nature and the arts, to feel unity with nature and to protect the environment Responses were recorded on a scale from -1 (opposed to my principles) to 7 (very important) Perceptions of anomie 18,19 • Social anomie 1. People think that there are no clear moral standards to follow 2. Everyone thinks of himself/herself and does not help others in need 3. Most of people think that if something works, it doesn't really matter whether it is right or wrong 4. People do not know who they can trust and rely on 5. Most of the people think that honesty doesn't work all the time; dishonesty is sometimes a better approach to get ahead 6. People are cooperative -reverse coded • Government anomie 1. The government works towards the welfare of people -reverse coded 2. The government is legitimate -reverse coded 3. The government uses its power legitimately -reverse coded 4. Politicians don't care about the problems of average person 5. The government laws and policies are effective -reverse coded 6. Some laws are not fair Responses were recorded on a scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree) and an average score for all items was calculated to achieve a total anomie score. We calculated separate averages to achieve a social anomie and government anomie score.

Schwartz 'Benevolence' Value 17
The next questionnaire asks about the things you personally value in life. Please answer in the space to the left of each item. First read the list of values below and choose the value that is most important to you and rate it 7. Next, choose the value that is opposed to what you value and rate it -1. If there is no such value, choose the value least important to you and rate it 0 or 1, according to its importance. Then rate the rest of the values in the list: • Benevolence, that is, to be loyal, honest, helpful, responsible, and forgiving Responses were recorded on a scale from -1 (opposed to my principles) to 7 (very important) Based on advice from reviewers, we placed all nine of our country-level variables from Part 2 in the same model (Table S47). We removed three variables that had an unacceptable Variation Inflation Factor (VIF) above 5 (Table S48). We then conduced a second model (Table S49) with the remaining 6 country-level variables. We found that greater tolerance for minorities as neighbors and greater social capital were associated with social mindfulness. This suggests that many of our constructs may broadly reflect social capital and a tolerance for outgroup members.