Charity Without Choice: The Impact of Receiving Prosocial Gifts on Subsequent Donations

Summary

This paper examines how receiving a prosocial gift — a charitable donation made to a cause in someone’s name — affects that recipient’s willingness to donate to the same charity later. Across four experiments (and a supplemental study), the authors find that when prosocial gifts are unrequested they can backfire: recipients are less willing to donate subsequently to the same organisation than people who received no gift. The effect is driven by a perceived threat to personal freedom (psychological reactance). Crucially, the negative effect disappears when recipients either explicitly requested the prosocial gift, the cause aligns with their identity, or they are given a choice about how the donation will be used after the gift. The paper offers clear managerial fixes for charities to protect future giving.

Key Points

Receiving an unrequested prosocial gift reduces recipients’ later willingness to donate to the same charity compared with receiving no gift.
The reduction is explained by perceived threat to freedom — recipients feel their choice has been taken away and exhibit reactance.
When the prosocial gift is explicitly requested by the recipient, the negative effect disappears (and can even increase future donations).
Giving recipients a choice about how the donation will be used (after the gift) restores their sense of freedom and removes the drop in future donations.
Identity congruence between recipient and cause also attenuates the negative effect — gifts aligned with a recipient’s identity are less likely to provoke reactance.
Findings replicate across different charities (Greenpeace, WWF) and with pre-registered designs, increasing confidence in generalisability.
Managerial implication: charities should enable recipients to choose how gifted donations are allocated, encourage prospective recipients to request prosocial gifts, and prompt givers to match causes to recipients’ identities.

Why should I read this?

Short version: if you run fundraising, sell prosocial gifts, or ever send donations on someone’s behalf — this matters. The study reveals a counter-intuitive pitfall: well-intentioned donation-gifts can reduce future support unless you give recipients back some control. Read it for a quick, evidence-backed fix (let people choose or encourage requested gifts) that can protect repeat giving and improve campaign design.

Source

Source: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/mar.70001?af=R