From Self to Others: Examining the Association Between Self-Compassion and Prosocial Behavior in Chinese Adolescents Using Latent Profile Analysis

Self-compassion involves a positive attitude towards oneself and has been conceptualized as a multidimensional construct, encompassing self-warmth and self-coldness. Considering the development of social function during adolescence, it is necessary to explore whether the positive attitude would transfer from self to others (i.e., prosocial behavior). Thus, the current study first aimed to examine the latent profiles of Chinese adolescents using latent profile analysis (LPA) and further examined the differences in prosocial behavior across these profiles, which helped to illustrate the distinct role of self-warmth and self-coldness on socially related outcomes.

Five hundred thirty-three Chinese adolescents completed assessments of self-compassion and prosocial behavior (261 females; 15–20 years, M = 17.18, SD = 0.71). The LPA was conducted to identify latent profiles of self-compassion, and ANOVA was further adopted to illustrate the differences of prosocial behavior across all the latent profiles of self-compassion.

Four latent profiles were identified: indifference (43.3%, low on all dimensions), uncompassionate (14.4%, high on self-coldness but low on self-warmth), compassionate (15.6%, high on self-warmth but low on self-coldness), and high responding (26.7%, high on all dimensions). Adolescents in the compassionate group showed the highest level of prosocial behavior, followed by the high responding group, the uncompassionate group, and the indifference group.

Findings supported that the latent profiles had specific characteristics in terms of prosocial behavior, indicating the relative independent promotive role of self-warmth on prosocial behavior.