Editing Kindness (section)

==In psychology==
Studies at Yale University used games with babies to conclude that kindness is inherent to human beings.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/video/magazine/1247467772000/can-babies-tell-right-from-wrong-.html|url-status=dead|title=Can Babies Tell Right From Wrong?, Babies at Yale University's Infant Cognition Center respond to "naughty" and "nice" puppets|work=New York Times (TimesVideo)|date=May 5, 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150712065555/https://www.nytimes.com/video/magazine/1247467772000/can-babies-tell-right-from-wrong-.html|archive-date=2015-07-12}}</ref> There are similar studies about the root of empathy in infancy<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/03/28/science/researchers-trace-empathy-s-roots-to-infancy.html?pagewanted=all|url-access=subscription|title=Researchers Trace Empathy's Roots to Infancy|first=Daniel|last=Goleman|date=1989-03-28|page=C1|newspaper=New York Times}}</ref> – with motor [[Mirroring (psychology)|mirroring]] developing in the early months of life,<ref>{{cite book|first=Daniel|last=Goleman|title=Emotional Intelligence|location=London|year=1996|publisher=Bloomsbury|pages=98–99}}</ref> and leading (optimally) to the concern shown by children for their peers in distress.<ref name=OK>{{cite book|first1=Adam|last1=
Phillips|first2=Barbara|last2=Taylor|title=On Kindness|location=London|year=2009}}</ref>{{rp|112}}

[[Barbara Taylor (historian)|Barbara Taylor]] and [[Adam Phillips (psychologist)|Adam Phillips]] stressed the element of necessary realism{{jargon inline|reason=what is "necessary realism"?|date=August 2023}} in adult kindness, as well as the way "real kindness changes people in the doing of it, often in unpredictable ways".{{r|OK|pages=96 & 12}}

Behaving kindly may improve a person's measurable [[well-being]]. Many studies have tried to test the hypothesis that doing something kind makes a person better off. A meta-analysis of 27 such studies found that the interventions studied (usually measuring short-term effects after brief acts of kindness, in [[Psychology#WEIRD_bias|WEIRD]] research subjects) supported the [[hypothesis]] that acting more kindly improves your well-being.<ref>{{cite journal|first1=Oliver Scott|last1=Curry|first2=Lee A.|last2=Rowland|first3=Caspar J.|last3=Van Lissa|first4=Sally|last4=Zlotowitz|first5=John|last5=McAlaney|first6=Harvey|last6=Whitehouse|title=Happy to help? A systematic review and meta-analysis of the effects of performing acts of kindness on the well-being of the actor|journal=Journal of Experimental Social Psychology|volume=76|year=2018|pages=320–329 |doi=10.1016/j.jesp.2018.02.014|doi-access=free}}</ref>