Advanced ACT with Steven C. Hayes
ACT helps people act on what matters to them. ProSocial brings that work to the groups they belong to, using eight Core Design Principles to show where cooperation is working, where it breaks down, and what a group might try next.
Who we are
ProSocial World helps people achieve meaningful collective outcomes by strengthening their capacity to cooperate. Our approach draws on evolutionary science, Elinor Ostrom's research into governing shared resources, and contextual behavioral science, the tradition behind ACT. Paul Atkins, David Sloan Wilson, and Steven C. Hayes set it out in their 2019 book Prosocial.
In practice, that means helping people clarify a shared purpose, hear perspectives that have been missed, make fair decisions, address conflict, and turn good intentions into workable agreements. We don't decide what groups should pursue. The methods adapt to the people and the setting, not the other way around.
The Core Design Principles
Each one points to something a group can look at, talk about, and change.
Resources
Bring to mind a team, clinic, organization, or community you belong to. Answer a short set of questions about how it works, and you'll get a personal report on the conditions for cooperation, organized around the eight Core Design Principles.
Take the assessmentA self-paced online course in four short modules, ending in a practical experiment with a group of your own. It's built for anyone who works with groups, including therapists, coaches, and facilitators.
Start the courseWant to go deeper? Prosocial: Using Evolutionary Science to Build Productive, Equitable, and Collaborative Groups (Atkins, Wilson, & Hayes, 2019) sets out the approach in full.
The principles in practice
ProSocial worked with Compassionate San Antonio to train 12 local co-researchers, who conducted 42 interviews about existing community collaborations. The project made visible the strengths, challenges, and possibilities in work already underway.
Read the case studyIn 2013, David Sloan Wilson, Elinor Ostrom, and Michael Cox showed that the conditions Ostrom found in successful commons groups apply to groups of every kind. That work is the foundation for the eight principles, and for the ProSocial process used with groups today.
Explore the ProSocial processGoing further
You bring the relationships and the understanding of your setting. ProSocial World contributes methods, research, and support, so the people doing the work stay at the center. A good place to start is a group-level assessment: when every member takes part, the report shows where people see things the same way and where they differ, which is often where the most useful conversations begin.
Tell us about a group you work with and what it wants to achieve. We'll explore how an assessment, or other support, could help.
Start a conversationOr email us directly at research@prosocial.world
