The feeling of respect or reverence toward someone can inspire altruistic, helpful and positive social behavior, according to a recent study.

Researchers found that a sense of awe, or an overwhelming feeling of reverence and admiration, "can help people escape their own egos," Medical Daily reported.

"Our investigation indicates that awe, although often fleeting and hard to describe, serves a vital social function. By diminishing the emphasis on the individual self, awe may encourage people to forgo strict self-interest to improve the welfare of others," Paul Piff, lead author of the study, said in a statement.

For the study, Piff and his colleagues conducted five studies.

In the first, the researchers asked a representative sample of more than 1,500 people from across the United States to complete a questionnaire that measured how predisposed they were to experience awe. The subjects were then asked to participate in a game where they were given 10 raffle tickets and had to decide how many, if any, to share with another participant who did not have any tickets. Researchers found a significant association between the tendency to experience awe and generosity.

In the other four experiments, the researchers asked groups of people (ranging in size from 75 to 254) to participate in an activity (e.g., watch a video or gaze at something in their environment) designed to elicit awe, a neutral state or another reaction, such as pride or amusement. The participants then engaged in an activity designed to measure what psychologists call pro-social behaviors, which is positive, helpful and intended to promote social acceptance and friendship. In every experiment, awe was significantly associated with pro-social behaviors, The Pacific Standard reported.

Researchers said they believe that awe induces a feeling of being diminished in the presence of something greater than oneself. It is this diminished sense of self that shifts focus away from an individual's need and toward the greater good, they wrote.

"When experiencing awe, you may not, egocentrically speaking, feel like you're at the center of the world anymore," Piff said. "By shifting attention toward larger entities and diminishing the emphasis on the individual self, we reasoned that awe would trigger tendencies to engage in pro-social behaviors that may be costly for you but that benefit and help others."

The findings are detailed in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.