For information about the ADA, including the revised 2010 ADA regulations, please visit the Department's website www.ADA.gov; or, for answers to specific questions, call the toll-free ADA Information Line at 800-514-0301 (Voice) or 800-514-0383 (TTY).
Definition of altruism. 1  1 : unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others charitable acts motivated purely by altruism. 2  2 : behavior by an animal that is not beneficial to or may be harmful to itself but that benefits others of its species.
The original use of the concept of altruism is traced to Auguste Comte, a French mathematician and philosopher during the first half of the 1800s. The French word that was later translated to altruism, was an adjective that meant, of or to others, what is another's, somebody else..