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In the last decade, developmental psychologist Robin Banerjee found that the number of research papers in psychology journals about kindness increased to more than 1000 compared to just 35 in the 1980s. Each paper offers a different perspective on the positive effects of kindness. One study conducted by Elizabeth Dunn showed that people who spent their money on someone else felt significantly happier than spending it on themselves regardless of the monetary amount. Another paper found that the warm glow we feel from doing kind deeds also lights up our brain's reward system. Still another research study on students with social anxiety found that those who did kind acts for others experienced a reduction in their symptoms. Sussex University neuroscientist Dan Campbell-Meiklejohn says, "We experience a sense of reward in parts of our brain when we are kind to others, just as we do when we eat yummy food or have a pleasant surprise. These parts of the brain become active and motivate us to do them again and again."
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