About

Paul K. Piff is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the UCI School of Social Ecology. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley. His research focuses on social psychology, social status, emotion, inequality, morality, prosocial behavior, and social connection. For a summary of his current research and projects, additional information can be found on his website. He is based at the Psychological Science department within the School of Social Ecology at the University of California Irvine.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Social psychology
• Psychology
• Economics
• Economic growth
• Sociology
• Demographic economics
• Law
• Development economics
• Epistemology
• Positive economics

Selected publications

• System circumvention: Dishonest‐illegal transgressions are perceived as justified in non‐meritocratic societies

  British Journal of Social Psychology · 2024-03-08 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  Does believing that "effort doesn't pay" in society shape how people view dishonest-illegal transgressions? Across five studies, we show that when people view societal success as non-meritocratic-that is, more dependent on luck and circumstances than on hard work-they are more lenient in their moral judgements of dishonest-illegal transgressions. Perceiving society as non-meritocratic predicted greater justifiability of dishonest-illegal transgressions in the United States (Study 2), and across 42 countries (N = 49,574; Study 1). And inducing participants to view society as non-meritocratic increased justifiability of others' dishonest-illegal transgressions, via greater feelings of sympathy (Studies 3 and 4). Next, we investigated the contours of these effects. Perceiving societal success as non-meritocratic rather than based on hard work causes people to view dishonest-illegal transgressions as more justifiable if they are perpetrated by the poor, but not the rich (Study 4), and if the dishonest-illegal transgressions are related to economic striving, such as money laundering and dealing illegal drugs (Study 5). In sum, when people see a social system as unfair, they show greater tolerance for dishonest-illegal transgressions perpetrated to circumvent the system.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Bridging me to we: Awe is a conduit to cohesive collectives

  Current Opinion in Psychology · 2024-12-17 · 10 citations

  reviewOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Experiences of awe, frequently elicited by the natural world (but also by art, music, human virtue, among other things), are profound and transformative. We argue that beyond its individual benefits, awe serves a vital social function: It expands an individual's perspective from narrow self-interest to others' needs and collective concerns. We review recent empirical evidence showcasing how awe shifts focus away from the self toward the larger entities one belongs to. These reductions in self-focus are, in turn, associated with systematic shifts in social-cognitive processes key to cohesive collective life: attentiveness to others, prosociality, conformity, and social connectedness. Given its socially-binding functions, awe may help inform solutions to pressing global challenges, including economic inequality, political polarization, and climate change.

  PublisherDOI

• Sharing the Sublime:Co-Experiences of Awe, Social Connection, and Meaning

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2024-01-01

  preprintOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Signals of discipline and puritanical challenges to liberty

  Behavioral and Brain Sciences · 2023-01-01 · 1 citations

  letter

  We extend the target authors' moral disciplining theory (MDT) by discussing signaling, proscriptive and prescriptive morality, and the dynamics by which signaling may operate in tandem with proscriptive and prescriptive forms of moral disciplining. We also suggest that MDT can help explain challenges to economic and social progress by revealing fundamental tensions between puritanical intuitions and liberal ideals.

  PublisherDOI

• Intuitive Sociology: Children Recognize Decision-Making Structures and Prefer Groups With Less-Concentrated Power

  Open Mind · 2022-01-01 · 6 citations

  articleOpen access

  From an early age, children recognize that people belong to social groups. However, not all groups are structured in the same way. The current study asked whether children recognize and distinguish among different decision-making structures. If so, do they prefer some decision-making structures over others? In these studies, children were told stories about two groups that went camping. In the hierarchical group, one character made all the decisions; in the egalitarian group, each group member made one decision. Without being given explicit information about the group's structures, 6- to 8-year-old children, but not 4- and 5-year-old children, recognized that the two groups had different decision-making structures and preferred to interact with the group where decision-making was shared. Children also inferred that a new member of the egalitarian group would be more generous than a new member of the hierarchical group. Thus, from an early age, children's social reasoning includes the ability to compare social structures, which may be foundational for later complex political and moral reasoning.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• If I Could Do It, So Can They: Among the Rich, Those With Humbler Origins are Less Sensitive to the Difficulties of the Poor

  Social Psychological and Personality Science · 2022-06-27 · 28 citations

  articleOpen access

  rich and expect the Became Rich to be more sympathetic toward social welfare (Studies 1a and b). However, we also find that these intuitions are misguided. Surveys of wealthy individuals (Studies 2a and b) reveal that, compared with the Born Rich, the Became Rich perceive improving one's socioeconomic conditions as less difficult, which, in turn, predicts less empathy for the poor, less perceived sacrifices by the poor, more internal attributions for poverty, and less support for redistribution. Corroborating this, imagining having experienced upward mobility (vs. beginning and staying at the top) causes people to view such mobility as less difficult, reducing empathy and support for those failing to move up (Study 3). These findings suggest that becoming rich may shift views about the poor in ways that run counter to common intuitions and cultural assumptions.

  PublisherDOI

• Imaginary worlds are <i>awesome</i>: Awe provides a key to understanding the individual and social functions of imaginary worlds

  Behavioral and Brain Sciences · 2022-01-01 · 3 citations

  letterSenior author

  Awe arises when one experiences something so extraordinary that it defies current understanding, prompting efforts to comprehend the initially incomprehensible. We situate awe within Dubourg and Baumard's framework for the prevalence and psychological underpinnings of imaginary worlds. We argue that imaginary worlds are powerful catalysts of awe, which, in turn, drive important individual and social outcomes.

  PublisherDOI

• The geography of goodwill: Recreational engagement with nature predicts prosociality across US states

  Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology · 2022-01-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  • We collected indicators of US state-level recreational nature engagement. • We collected indicators of US state-level prosociality (e.g., volunteering, empathy) and antisociality (e.g., violent crime). • State-level recreational nature engagement is a positive predictor of prosociality and – to a lesser degree – a negative predictor of antisociality. • A multiverse analysis shows that these results are robust across analytical choices.

  PublisherDOI

• Personal and Social Means Can Be (But Need Not Be) Opposing: The Case of Social Class

  Psychological Inquiry · 2022-01-02

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• The Social Effects of an Awesome Solar Eclipse

  Psychological Science · 2022-08-09 · 35 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Astronomical events such as solar eclipses have played a transformative role in human social collectives as sources of collective wonder, inspiration, and reconciliation. Do celestial phenomena systematically shape individuals and their groups? Guided by scientific treatments of awe as an experience that helps individuals form into collectives, we used Twitter data ( N = 2,891,611 users) to examine the social impact of a historic, awe-inspiring celestial event: the 2017 solar eclipse. Relative to individuals residing outside the eclipse’s path, individuals inside it exhibited more awe and expressed less self-focused and more prosocial, affiliative, humble, and collective language (Study 1). Further, individuals who exhibited elevated awe surrounding the eclipse used more prosocial, affiliative, humble, and collective language relative to their preeclipse levels and relative to users who exhibited less awe (Study 2). These findings indicate that astronomical events may play a vital collective function by arousing awe and social tendencies that orient individuals toward their collectives.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Dacher Keltner

  33 shared

• Azim Shariff

  University of British Columbia

  14 shared

• Lara B. Aknin

  Simon Fraser University

  10 shared

• Brett Mercier

  University of Toronto

  10 shared

• Dylan Wiwad

  Slack Incorporated (United States)

  10 shared

• Michael W. Kraus

  Yale University

  9 shared

• Angela R. Robinson

  Victoria University of Wellington

  8 shared

• Andres G. Martinez

  Sonoma State University

  7 shared

Education

• Ph.D.

  University of California, Berkeley