Framing charitable donations as exceptional expenses increases giving.

Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied Framing Charitable Donations as Exceptional Expenses Increases Giving

Demand for Giving to Multiple Charities: Theory and Experiments

We study how competition among charities affects individuals’ giving behavior. We characterize a situation where a higher rebate subsidy shifts donations from one charity to another and increases total donations. We conduct two experiments: (i) individualized charitable giving where free riding incentives are shut down; and (ii) multi-donor charitable giving. We derive the demand for giving at ...

How much to donate, and to whom? The effects of framing of charitable solicitations on moral judgment

We study how the framing of the charitable “ask” affects moral judgment and thus how much to donate and to whom. We develop a theoretical framework grounded in insights developed by Adam Smith in his Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) and psychological construal level theory. The framework rests on the effects of variations in the salience of donors’ financial interest and in their distance/deta...

Neural responses to taxation and voluntary giving reveal motives for charitable donations.

Civil societies function because people pay taxes and make charitable contributions to provide public goods. One possible motive for charitable contributions, called "pure altruism," is satisfied by increases in the public good no matter the source or intent. Another possible motive, "warm glow," is only fulfilled by an individual's own voluntary donations. Consistent with pure altruism, we fin...

(Un)Informed Charitable Giving∗

Evidence suggests little informed giving. To understand this behavior, we examine a model of charitable giving with costly information. We find that an individual who considers a smaller contribution is less likely to seek information, and thus the percentage of informed giving diminishes as the population grows. We also find that a direct grant to the charity exacerbates crowding-out by discou...