Washington, November 7 : Ever wonder what drives us to donate money for a good cause or financially helping out a person in need? Well, researchers at Claremont Graduate University say the answer may lie in oxytoxin, a mammalian hormone involved in social recognition and bonding.

Neuroeconomist Paul J. Zak and his colleagues gave doses of oxytocin and a placebo to participants, who were then offered a blinded, one-time decision on how to split a sum of money with a stranger who could accept or reject the split.

Participants who were administered oxytocin offered 80 per cent more money than those given a placebo, they found.

According to Zak, the findings indicate that though humans are inherently altruistic, they are also generous when they feel empathy toward one another.

“Oxytocin specifically and powerfully affected generosity using real money when participants had to think about another’s feelings. This result confirms our earlier work showing that oxytocin affects trust, but with a dramatically larger effect for generosity,” he said.

Zak said that the present study showed oxytocin’s effect on generosity to be more than three times larger than his previous study from 2005, which demonstrated that oxytocin increases trust.

In his previous studies, Zak had shown a relationship between oxytocin and trust, making a clear case that the ancient hormone causes a shift in brain chemistry. The more people trusted one another and cooperate, the more they all benefited together, he had said at that time.

The new study has been published in the online, open access journal PLoS ONE. (ANI)