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Competitive Helping in Online Giving
Nichola Raihani & Sarah Smith
Current Biology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Unconditional generosity in humans is a puzzle. One possibility is that individuals benefit from being seen as generous if there is competition for access to partners and if generosity is a costly - and therefore reliable - signal of partner quality. The "competitive helping" hypothesis predicts that people will compete to be the most generous, particularly in the presence of attractive potential partners. However, this key prediction has not been directly tested. Using data from online fundraising pages, we demonstrate competitive helping in the real world. Donations to fundraising pages are public and made sequentially. Donors can therefore respond to the behavior of previous donors, creating a potential generosity tournament. Our test of the competitive helping hypothesis focuses on the response to large, visible donations. We show that male donors show significantly stronger responses (by donating more) when they are donating to an attractive female fundraiser and responding to a large donation made by another male donor. The responses for this condition are around four times greater than when males give to less-attractive female (or male) fundraisers or when they respond to a large donation made by a female donor. Unlike males, females do not compete in donations when giving to attractive male fundraisers. These data suggest that males use competitive helping displays in the presence of attractive females and suggest a role for sexual selection in explaining unconditional generosity.
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Tomasz Zaleskiewicz, Agata Gasiorowska & Pelin Kesebir
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, July 2015, Pages 67-76
Abstract:
According to terror management theory, people deal with the potential for anxiety that results from the knowledge of the inevitability of death by holding on to sources of value that exist within their cultural worldview. Acting prosocially is one such source of value, and previous research suggests that reminders of mortality increase the desire for prosociality. In three studies, we tested the hypothesis that mortality reminders would lead to more generous allocation of financial resources and to more satisfaction derived from acting generously. Using the dictator game (Study 1), the ultimatum game (Study 2), and a quasi-naturalistic giving situation (Study 3) we showed that participants reminded of their mortality were not only more generous but also more satisfied the more money they donated. Moreover, Study 3 demonstrated that people reminded of their mortality derived higher satisfaction from prosocial behavior and such behavior was associated with better suppression of death-related thoughts. We conclude that acting prosocially in the face of mortality thoughts effectively soothes death anxiety and in turn produces psychological satisfaction.
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Sex Differences in Psychological Factors Associated with Social Discounting
Elizabeth Olson et al.
Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, forthcoming
Abstract:
The social discounting paradigm is a powerful means of quantifying altruism in humans, who are typically willing to forgo some amount of personal earnings in exchange for increased earnings for another person. The amount of money that people are willing to forgo decreases with increasing social distance. In this study, we examined variables related to sex, intolerance of uncertainty, and empathy, all of which are theorized to affect the social discounting rate. Participants (27 men and 28 women) completed measures of intolerance of uncertainty, empathy, and social discounting. We found sex differences in psychological predictors of social discounting: in women, empathy (but not intolerance of uncertainty) predicts the social discounting rate, while in men, social discounting is associated with intolerance of uncertainty (but not empathy). Possible neurobiological, social, and cognitive explanations for this sex difference are discussed.
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Stated goals and their influence on helping behavior toward ingroups and outgroups
Mitchell Lorenz, Ruth Warner & Molly VanDeursen
Journal of Applied Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
When seeking to motivate individuals to help, helping behavior may be framed in terms of power-oriented, results focused, goals or value-oriented, ideologically based, goals. In two studies, participants were presented with a call for assistance benefitting an ingroup or an outgroup. The stated goal associated with helping behavior was power-oriented or value-oriented. Participants showed more willingness to help on behalf of an outgroup when they believed the charitable organization had value-oriented goals and more willingness to help on behalf of their ingroup when they believed the charitable organization had power-oriented goals. The results suggest that organizations should consider the relationship between who will benefit and who is providing assistance to maximize the likelihood that assistance will be provided.
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Noblesse oblige emerges (with time): Power enhances intergenerational beneficence
Leigh Plunkett Tost, Kimberly Wade-Benzoni & Hana Huang Johnson
Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, forthcoming
Abstract:
Across four experiments, we examine how the experience of power affects intergenerational decision-making. We argue, and empirically demonstrate, that the experience of power enhances intergenerational beneficence. This effect emerges because the experience of power in intergenerational dilemmas prompts a sense of social responsibility among powerholders. In particular, the experience of power in intergenerational contexts leads people to feel an obligation to look out for the long-term interests of others, which in turn enhances generosity to future others. Thus, the positive effect of power on intergenerational beneficence is mediated by a sense of responsibility to look after others' long-term interests.
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Lisa Cavanaugh, James Bettman & Mary Frances Luce
Journal of Marketing Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Marketers often employ a variety of positive emotions to encourage consumption or promote a particular behavior (e.g., to buy, donate, or recycle) benefiting an organization or cause. We show that specific positive emotions do not universally increase prosocial behavior but rather encourage different types of prosocial behavior. Four studies show that whereas positive emotions (i.e., love, hope, pride, compassion) all induce prosocial behavior toward close entities (relative to a neutral emotional state), only love induces prosocial behavior toward distant others and international organizations. Love's effect is driven by a distinct form of broadening, characterized by extending feelings of social connection and the boundary of caring to be more inclusive of others regardless of relatedness. Love - as a trait and a momentary emotion - is unique among positive emotions in fostering connectedness that other positive emotions (hope and pride) do not and broadening behavior in a way that other connected emotions (compassion) do not. This research contributes to the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotion by demonstrating a distinct type of broadening for love and adds an important qualification to the general finding that positive emotions uniformly encourage prosocial behavior.
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Gordon Kraft-Todd, Michael Norton & David Rand
Yale Working Paper, February 2015
Abstract:
Patterns of charitable giving are inconsistent with either pure selfishness or true altruism: most people give, but only in amounts. The authors explain - and then alter - this pattern of giving by extending the self-concept maintenance model of dishonesty to positive behaviors. The authors suggest that people donate just enough to feel good about themselves, and use this model to develop a new method for increasing charitable donations. If donors' options are limited to giving nothing or giving a large amount, many will choose to give (maintaining the feeling of being a good person), even when that donation amount is substantially larger than what they would have given in a standard unconstrained donation. In a series of experiments, the authors provide evidence of charitable giving patterns consistent with self-concept maintenance, and show that restricting donors' options to a binary all-or-none donation choice raises substantially more money than an unconstrained donation choice.
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Framing Charitable Donations as Exceptional Expenses Increases Giving
Abigail Sussman, Eesha Sharma & Adam Alter
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, forthcoming
Abstract:
Many articles have examined the psychological drivers of charitable giving, but little is known about how people mentally budget for charitable gifts. The present research aims to address this gap by investigating how perceptions of donations as exceptional (uncommon and infrequent) rather than ordinary (common and frequent) expenses might affect budgeting for and giving to charity. We provide the first demonstration that exceptional framing of an identical item can directly influence mental budgeting processes, and yield societal benefits. In 5 lab and field experiments, exceptional framing increased charitable behavior, and diminished the extent to which people considered the effect of the donation on their budgets. The current work extends our understanding of mental accounting and budgeting for charitable gifts, and demonstrates practical techniques that enable fundraisers to enhance the perceived exceptionality of donations.