The CalArts Compassion Project documents incidents of kindness, generosity, assistance, understanding, and acceptance that occur within the CalArts community.  You can participate by filing a report of a compassionate event, or you can browse the reports left by others. 

WHY THIS PROJECT? 

Our brains have a "negativity bias"- which means our attitudes are more heavily influenced by downbeat news than good news. According to Roy F. Baumeister, a professor of social psychology at Florida State University, “bad emotions and bad feedback have more impact than good ones. Bad impressions and bad stereotypes are quicker to form and more resistant to disconfirmation than good ones.” 

The good news, according to Professor Baumeister, is that “many good events can overcome the psychological effects of a bad one, at a ratio of 5 goods for every one bad."

"That’s a good reminder that we all need to engage in more acts of kindness — toward others and ourselves — to balance out the world. " (article source: http://goo.gl/FkA4lO)

SO THIS IS AN EXPERIMENT. 

Let's see if engaging in, and knowing about, more acts of kindness, generosity, assistance, understanding and acceptance at CalArts makes a difference for us as individuals and as a community.

HOW TO PARTICIPATE:

You may report an act of compassion that you engage in directly or observe directly by clicking on SUBMIT A REPORT.  Yes, you may do so anonymously. Your report will be vetted and posted within 24 hours or less.  Two things to keep in mind:

1.  Please don't include names.  We want to safeguard everyone's privacy.  Instead, we recommend you describe events with general identifiers such as "a faculty member spent 3 hours with me on the sound for my film" or "I witnessed two students help another student who had tripped on the steps."  If you forget and include names, we will change the names to general identifiers for you.

2.  Again, in consideration of privacy, we won't post photos or videos of members of the community.  But if you want to include a photo or video that is uplifting or somehow related to your post, go for it.

3.  We won't post complaints or criticism or gossip.  Makes sense, right?  However, if you want to let us know your thoughts about this project, click on CONTACT US.

Read reports left by others by clicking on REPORTS.

Get new reports sent to your email address by clicking on GET ALERTS.

MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE RESEARCH ON COMPASSION: