Who is willing to help Ukrainian refugees and why? Individual prosocial dispositions and superordinate European identity related to intergroup helping intentions

Abstract

In 2022, Europe experienced unprecedented citizen mobilizations to help Ukrainian refugees. Based on two parallel scholarship lines, we examined individual prosocial dispositions and superordinate identities related to intentions to help Ukrainians. Employing a French-speaking student sample in Belgium (N = 374), in Study 1 we showed that dispositional prosociality and European identification were both positively related to intentions to help Ukrainians. An interaction qualified these main effects, so that highly prosocial European identifiers were particularly willing to help. With a nationwide quota sample of the French-speaking population in Belgium (N = 371), in Study 2 we identified two processes mediating the relationship of dispositional prosociality and European identification with intentions to help Ukrainians. On the one hand, dispositional prosociality was positively related to empathy towards Ukrainians, which in turn predicted participants’ helping intentions. On the other hand, European identification was positively related to both empathy and identity fusion with Ukrainians, which in turn predicted participants’ helping intentions. Overall, these findings suggest that individual prosocial dispositions and superordinate identities represent two cumulative pathways to intergroup helping. Concluding, we discuss common and specific processes related to intentions to help Ukrainians, as compared to other refugee groups.