Greater Good Science Center • Magazine • In Action • In Education
What Makes a Hero?
This month, Greater Good features videos of a presentation by Philip Zimbardo, the world-renowned psychologist perhaps best known for his infamous Stanford Prison Experiment. In his talk, Zimbardo discusses the psychology of evil and of heroism, exploring why good people sometimes turn bad and how we can encourage more people to perform heroic acts. In this excerpt from his talk, he zeroes in on his research and educational program designed to foster the “heroic imagination.”
More on Heroism
Watch the video of Philip Zimbardo's Greater Good talk on heroism.
Read his essay on " The Banality of Heroism ," which further explores the conditions that can promote heroism vs. evil.
Read this Greater Good essay on the "psychology of the bystander."
Learn more about Zimbardo's Heroic Imagination Project.
What makes us good? What makes us evil?
Research has uncovered many answers to the second question: Evil can be fostered by dehumanization, diffusion of responsibility, obedience to authority, unjust systems, group pressure, moral disengagement, and anonymity, to name a few.
But when we ask why people become heroic, research doesn’t yet have an answer. It could be that heroes have more compassion or empathy; maybe there’s a hero gene; maybe it’s because of their levels of oxytocin—research by neuroeconomist Paul Zak has shown that this “love hormone” in the brain increases the likelihood you’ll demonstrate altruism. We don’t know for sure.
I believe that heroism is different than altruism and compassion. For the last five years, my colleagues and I have been exploring the nature and roots of heroism, studying exemplary cases of heroism and surveying thousands of people about their choices to act (or not act) heroically. In that time, we’ve come to define heroism as an activity with several parts.
First, it’s performed in service to others in need—whether that’s a person, group, or community—or in defense of certain ideals. Second, it’s engaged in voluntarily, even in military contexts, as heroism remains an act that goes beyond something required by military duty. Third, a heroic act is one performed with recognition of possible risks and costs, be they to one’s physical health or personal reputation, in which the actor is willing to accept anticipated sacrifice. Finally, it is performed without external gain anticipated at the time of the act.
Simply put, then, the key to heroism is a concern for other people in need—a concern to defend a moral cause, knowing there is a personal risk, done without expectation of reward.
By that definition, then, altruism is heroism light—it doesn’t always involve a serious risk. Compassion is a virtue that may lead to heroism, but we don’t know that it does. We’re just now starting to scientifically distinguish heroism from these other concepts and zero in on what makes a hero.
My work on heroism follows 35 years of research in which I studied the psychology of evil, including my work on the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment . The two lines of research aren’t as different as they might seem; they’re actually two sides of the same coin.
A key insight from research on heroism so far is that the very same situations that inflame the hostile imagination in some people, making them villains, can also instill the heroic imagination in other people, prompting them to perform heroic deeds.
Take the Holocaust. Christians who helped Jews were in the same situation as other civilians who helped imprison or kill Jews, or ignored their suffering. The situation provided the impetus to act heroically or malevolently. Why did some people choose one path or the other?
Another key insight from my research has been that there’s no clear line between good and evil. Instead, the line is permeable; people can cross back and forth between it.
This is an idea wonderfully represented in an illusion by M. C. Escher, at left. When you squint and focus on the white as the figures and the black as the background, you see a world full of angels and tutus dancing around happily. But now focus on the black as the figures and the white as the background: Now it’s a world full of demons.
What Escher’s telling us is that the world is filled with angels and devils, goodness and badness, and these dark and light aspects of human nature are our basic yin and yang. That is, we all are born with the capacity to be anything. Because of our incredible brains, anything that is imaginable becomes possible, anything that becomes possible can get transformed into action, for better or for worse.
Some people argue humans are born good or born bad; I think that’s nonsense. We are all born with this tremendous capacity to be anything, and we get shaped by our circumstances—by the family or the culture or the time period in which we happen to grow up, which are accidents of birth; whether we grow up in a war zone versus peace; if we grow up in poverty rather than prosperity.
George Bernard Shaw captured this point in the preface to his great play “Major Barbara”: “Every reasonable man and woman is a potential scoundrel and a potential good citizen. What a man is depends upon his character what’s inside. What he does and what we think of what he does depends on upon his circumstances.”
So each of us may possess the capacity to do terrible things. But we also posses an inner hero; if stirred to action, that inner hero is capable of performing tremendous goodness for others.
Another conclusion from my research is that few people do evil and fewer act heroically. Between these extremes in the bell curve of humanity are the masses—the general population who do nothing, who I call the “reluctant heroes”—those who refuse the call to action and, by doing nothing, often implicitly support the perpetrators of evil.
So on this bell curve of humanity, villains and heroes are the outliers. The reluctant heroes are the rest. What we need to discover is how to give a call to service to this general population. How do we make them aware of the evil that exists? How do we prevent them from getting seduced to the dark side?
We don’t yet have a recipe for creating heroes, but we have some clues, based on the stories of some inspiring heroes.
I love the story of a wonderful nine-year-old Chinese boy, who I call a dutiful hero. In 2008, there was a massive earthquake in China’s Szechuan province. The ceiling fell down on a school, killing almost all the kids in it. This kid escaped, and as he was running away he noticed two other kids struggling to get out. He ran back and saved them. He was later asked, “Why did you do that?” He replied, “I was the hall monitor! It was my duty, it was my job to look after my classmates!”
This perfectly illustrates what I call the “heroic imagination,” a focus on one’s duty to help and protect others. For him, it was cultivated by being assigned this role of hall monitor.
Another story: Irena Sendler was a Polish hero, a Catholic woman who saved at least 2,500 Jewish kids who were holed up in the Warsaw ghetto that the Nazis had erected. She was able to convince the parents of these kids to allow her to smuggle them out of the ghetto to safety. To do this, she organized a network.
That is a key principle of heroism: Heroes are most effective not alone but in a network. It’s through forming a network that people have the resources to bring their heroic impulses to life.
What these stories suggest is that every one of us can be a hero. Through my work on heroism, I’ve become even more convinced that acts of heroism don’t just arrive from truly exceptional people but from people placed in the right circumstance, given the necessary tools to transform compassion into heroic action.
Building on these insights, I have helped to start a program designed to learn more of heroism and to create the heroes of tomorrow.
The Heroic Imagination Project (HIP) is amplifying the voice of the world’s quiet heroes, using research and education networks to promote a heroic imagination in everyone, and then empower ordinary people of all ages and nations to engage in extraordinary acts of heroism. We want to democratize the notion of heroism, to emphasize that most heroes are ordinary people; it’s the act that’s extraordinary.
There are already a lot of great heroes projects out there, such as the Giraffe Heroes Project . The HIP is unique in that it’s the only one encouraging research into heroism, because there’s very little.
Here are a few key insights from research we’ve done surveying 4,000 Americans from across the country. Each of these statements is valid after controlling for all demographic variables, such as education and socioeconomic status.
Heroes surround us. One in five—20 percent—qualify as heroes, based on the definition of heroism I provide above. Seventy-two percent report helping another person in a dangerous emergency. Sixteen percent report whistle blowing on an injustice. Six percent report sacrificing for a non-relative or stranger. Fifteen percent report defying an unjust authority. And not one of these people has been formally recognized as a hero.
Opportunity matters. Most acts of heroism occur in urban areas, where there are more people and more people in need. You’re not going to be a hero if you live in the suburbs. No shit happens in the suburbs!
Education matters. The more educated you are, the more likely you are to be a hero, I think because you are more aware of situations.
Volunteering matters. One third of all the sample who were heroes also had volunteered significantly, up to 59 hours a week.
Gender matters. Males reported performing acts of heroism more than females. I think this is because women tend not to regard a lot of their heroic actions as heroic. It’s just what they think they’re supposed to do for their family or a friend.
Race matters. Blacks were eight times more likely than whites to qualify as heroes. We think that’s in part due to the rate of opportunity. (In our next survey, we’re going to track responses by area code to see if in fact these heroes are coming from inner cities.
Personal history matters. Having survived a disaster or personal trauma makes you three times more likely to be a hero and a volunteer.
Based on these insights into heroism, we’ve put together a toolkit for potential heroes, especially young heroes in training, who already have opportunities to act heroically when they’re kids, such as by opposing bullying.
A first step is to take the “hero pledge,” a public declaration on our website that says you’re willing to be a hero in waiting. It’s a pledge “to act when confronted with a situation where I feel something is wrong,” “to develop my heroic abilities,” and “to believe in the heroic capacities within myself and others, so I can build and refine them.”
You can also take our four-week “Hero Challenge” mini-course online to help you develop your heroic muscles. The challenge may not require you to do anything heroic, but it’s training you to be heroic. And we offer more rigorous, research-based education and training programs for middle and high schools, corporations, and the millitary that make people aware of the social factors that produce passivity, inspire them to take positive civic action, and encourage the skills needed to consistently translate heroic impulses into action.
We’re also in the process of creating an Encyclopedia of Heroes, a collection of hero stories from all over the world. Not just all the classic ones and fictional ones, but ones that people from around the world are going to send in, so they can nominate ordinary heroes with a picture and a story. It will be searchable, so you can find heroes by age, gender, city and country. These are the unsung, quiet heroes—they do their own thing, put themselves in danger, defend a moral cause, help someone in need. And we want to highlight them. We want them to be inspirational to other people just like them.
Essentially, we’re trying to build the social habits of heroes, to build a focus on the other, shifting away from the “me” and toward the “we.” As the poet John Donne wrote: “No man [or woman] is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; … any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”
So every person is part of humanity. Each person’s pulse is part of humanity’s heartbeat. Heroes circulate the life force of goodness in our veins. And what the world needs now is more heroes—you. It’s time to take action against evil.
About the Author
Philip Zimbardo
Philip Zimbardo, Ph.D. , is a professor emeritus of psychology at Stanford University, a professor at Palo Alto University, a two-time past president of the Western Psychological Association, and a past president of the American Psychological Association. He is also the author of the best-selling book The Lucifer Effect and the president of the Heroic Imagination Project .
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Very nice information. In this world this is the very difficult question that what makes people good or evil. This post has helped a lot to understand the difference. Actually in my point of it depends upon the individual that what he/she thinks. If he/she thinks negative all the time them they became evil and thinking vice versa makes them good.
Andrew | 2:31 am, January 19, 2011 | Link
I really like reading this article because there are many individuals in the world that are heroes but are not recognized. Heroes that have help humanity progress and prosper have fought with the greatest weapons which are love, respect, sincerity, and peace. The governments that have had the greatest fear of seeing people free have always use war for colonization, genocide, and false treaties. However, love is much stronger than war, and thanks to the modern forms of communication and exchange of information, more people are united for peace and do not support or participate in colonization or human genocide. Since the start of humanity most people have use peace to progress, few have participated in war and few are participating. May peace prevail on earth!
Victor | 7:48 pm, January 29, 2011 | Link
A son raising up against an evil father. A brother standing up to a bully attacking his sibling. A stranger rallying to the side of a woman being assaulted in the street.
My sons are my strength. My reason to help others, that they may find the help they need in their lives.
pops | 9:39 am, February 3, 2011 | Link
Of course religion and eduction has a big impact on a child. But once a child is trying to live a good life (earning good karma or call it whatever you want) good things will happen to that child and he or she will recognize this.
So I think you can definitely change from evil to good.. maybe you _can be changed_ from good to evil.
Massud Hosseini | 7:28 am, September 17, 2011 | Link
Actually in my point of it depends upon the individual that what he/she thinks
asalah | 9:41 pm, September 24, 2011 | Link
“Research has uncovered many answers to the second question: Evil can be fostered by dehumanization, diffusion of responsibility, obedience to authority, unjust systems, group pressure, moral disengagement, and anonymity, to name a few.” <—What I find amazing about this statement is that anything is being branded “evil” at all. Well, maybe not. Relativism seems to be something that’s employed when convenient, disregarded when it’s not.
Kukri | 6:58 pm, November 6, 2011 | Link
This is a very comprehensive discussion on heroism. Victor makes a great point in his comment about how most heroes go unnoticed by the vast majority of people. I think that lack of notoriety is part of what it means to be a hero: doing that which is unexpected without the need for a pat on the back. quotes for facebook status
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When a sniper’s bullet hits one soldier and misses the person next to him, that alone does not make the wounded soldier more heroic.
brokesteves | 6:10 am, April 24, 2012 | Link
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Definition of Heroism Essay: Learn to Write by Example
By: Tasha Kolesnikova
In order to better understand the course of students' thoughts, their ideals, and goals, high school teachers often ask to write a definition of heroism essay. To evaluate the concept of "hero", you need to analyze a particular character's qualities. Don't worry if you don't know how to do it. In the following paragraphs, you will find useful tips for preparing and writing an essay.
Definition of Heroism Essay Sample
Choose a worthy example of a hero, essay structure.
Recently, the word "heroism" has become increasingly used. In the traditional sense, heroism is the highest manifestation of devotion and courage in public duty performance. A hero is a person who, for his achievements or qualities, is seen as an ideal, an example to follow. Who really deserves this high title - a true hero? I believe that only those people who can sacrifice themselves for the good of others become heroes.
Heroism, in my opinion, is the highest manifestation of humanity. Only people with truly noble qualities, who have compassion and responsibility, are able to feel the plight of others and give their lives for the sake of others. But often, heroism is a reward for someone's imperfection, injustice.
We can recall many vivid examples of figurative coverage of this idea. One of the best among them is John Coffey, a tragic hero, the protagonist of Stephen King's novel The Green Mile. With the help of his gift, this man commits a heroic act - he tries to save two girls from death, although he himself may be suspected of murder. In the end, he is sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit, but on the side of this courageous and noble man - the truth and the reader's sympathy.
Acts of heroism are manifested in some unusual, special conditions in which the one who must instantly make his choice (and for this, he must be at least a decent person). It is a pity that such circumstances often arise as a result of the irresponsibility of those whose job it was to avoid such situations. Therefore, the inevitable tragedy of the victim, retribution for someone else's guilt is acutely felt in the heroic. Examples of this in history and in modern life as much as you want. Don't firefighters in Australia who risked their lives to save people and animals from a terrible fire deserve the title of heroes? And aren't the hundreds of doctors who are helping people who have been struck by the coronavirus pandemic at the cost of their own health a hero? Of course, they are real heroes - not from a book, not from a movie, but in real life.
Thus, only courageous and noble people are capable of heroism. It requires a willingness to make a choice in favor of those who need your efforts at an extremely important time. Of course, this is peculiar only to high moral people and is manifested in their actions not every day but in special tragic circumstances that require sacrifice.
How to Write a Definition of Heroism Essay
This type of paper requires you to personally interpret a separate concept. The concept of heroism makes it possible to write an interesting and extensive essay-definition. Next, we talk in more detail about what to keep in mind when writing a definition of heroism essay.
We consider the heroes of those people or characters who, in our opinion, correspond to the "heroic" qualities of character traits. Some believe that heroes can be ordinary people who possess such qualities as selflessness, devotion, and courage. Others are convinced that true heroic qualities can be inherent only in Marvel superheroes. In your essay, you should set a good example of those you consider heroes.
An interesting example of an epic hero is Odysseus. Thanks to his intelligence and observation, he saves his crew, showing responsibility for its fate. He is characterized by courage, bravery, and determination.
Another example of a heroic epic is Beowulf. As in every epoch, this hero is brave and unrestrained, fights with fears unarmed and ready to die, obeying fate.
History has given us the names of many heroes. One of them was Martin Luther King Jr., a well-known black rights activist. King inspired people with his speech and his thoughts on the just and peaceful coexistence of people of different skin colors. Many people around the world still follow his ideas.
The worldview of Martin Luther King was greatly influenced by the ideas of another hero - Mahatma Gandhi. He professed the principles of nonviolence and commitment to the truth. He has the saying, "Truth is God."
If fictional characters inspire you with superpowers, then good examples of modern heroes can be even Batman or Superman, who constantly save the world.
Start by defining the concept. In the introduction, you should give the traditional definition of a hero. In this way, you will create a context and give the reader an initial understanding of the word. Then describe the term in your own words in the thesis statement. It is important to start with something exciting to get the reader's attention.
Tell about your hero in the body of the essay. What makes a hero famous? That's right - his heroic deeds. So in the main part of the essay, choose your example of a real hero and describe his actions that inspired you. If you want to illustrate your vision of defining a hero on the example of several characters - write about each of them in a separate paragraph. A few quotes can enrich your text.
Begin each paragraph with a thematic sentence. How to write these sentences? Ask yourself the following questions:
- What is the dictionary definition of the term "hero"? Perform your assignment, supporting the idea with the names of legendary figures.
- What character traits do you consider heroic? Virtue, courage, self-sacrifice - analyze in detail each manifestation of these traits.
- Why do you consider this or that person a hero? Obviously, because they have "heroic" traits.
Conclude with a summary of the main points. Review the topic sentences of each paragraph. They can be a good way to draw conclusions. You can also complete the essay by referring to the thesis in the introduction. If your hero essay has affected your life, the conclusion is just a good place to mention it. Write about this experience briefly and succinctly.
Check out our other web pages for more essay help and essay editing . Alternatively, you may wish to use our proofreading services for polishing and perfecting your essay to give you that extra grade boost!
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For me this topic of the essay is the easiest as I was really into Greek mythology when I was a child, so I have a great deal of examples in the back of my mind😂
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What It Means To Be A Hero
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