Experienced Compassion and Prosocial Behavior: Does State Optimism Mediates the Relationship?

Abstract

We draw on affective event theory (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996) to explore the association between experienced compassion and prosocial behavior with the mediating role of state optimism among nurses of public sector hospitals in Pakistan. We collected data in three time lags from 406 nurses and their colleagues using self-administered questionnaire survey. Findings indicate that experienced compassion results inprosocial behavior among nurses. However, this association is partially mediated by state optimism.Albeit, our findings are is in line with earlier studies which maintained that experienced compassion at workplace trigger positive emotions in employees which ultimately translate into positive attitudes and behaviors, however, linking of compassion with prosocial behavior, and identification of distinct positive emotional state i.e., state optimism as a mediator are the novel theoretical contributions of our study. The strengths, limitations, implications, and future research directions are highlighted