Monetary Rewards, Image Concern, and Intrinsic Motivation: Evidence from a Survey on Blood Donation

Using original survey data, this paper examines whether monetary rewards and honor rewards encourage or discourage blood donation. On the use of monetary rewards, we find that i) the overall sample’s response to monetary rewards is positive, and ii) people who volunteer more frequently, people who donated blood regularlt and people who donate blood to help others respond less positively to monetary rewards than otherwise. For honor rewards, we find that i) the overall sample’s response is negative, and ii) people who volunteer more frequently, and people who donated blood regularly respond more negatively than otherwise. We also find that people who derived greater social image rewards do not respond less positively to a discount on future use of blood, and respond more positively to appeals for donation than those who derived less social image rewards. Our findings are broadly consistent with predictions from Benabou and Tirole (2006).