Nostalgia Promoting Pro-Social Behavior and Its Psychological Mechanism

Nostalgia is a kind of socio-emotional that refers to personal sentimentality caused by recalling objects, people, places, experiences or feelings from the past. Studies have found nostalgia has a positive effect on the mental health and can also promote pro-social behavior of individuals. This paper reviews the promoting effect of nostalgia on the altruism, commonweal and social rule and relational pro-social behaviors. Moreover, the author puts forward possible psychological me-chanisms and theoretical explanations. Future studies should further investigate the relevant psychological mechanism and moderated effects of individual differences, the study on the re-finement of the nostalgia and pro-social behavior researches