IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/48779.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Reluctant altruism and peer pressure in charitable giving

Author

Listed:
  • Reyniers, Diane
  • Bhalla, Richa

Abstract

Subjects donate individually (control group) or in pairs (treatment group). Those in pairs reveal their donation decision to each other. Average donations in the treatment group are significantly higher than in the control group. Paired subjects have the opportunity to revise their donation decision after discussion. Pair members shift toward each others' initial decisions. Subjects are happier with their decision when their donations are larger, but those in pairs are less happy, controlling for amount donated. These findings suggest reluctant altruism due to peer pressure in charitable giving.

Suggested Citation

  • Reyniers, Diane & Bhalla, Richa, 2013. "Reluctant altruism and peer pressure in charitable giving," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 48779, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:48779
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/48779/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mujcic, Redzo & Frijters, Paul, 2011. "Altruism in Society: Evidence from a Natural Experiment Involving Commuters," IZA Discussion Papers 5648, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Becker, Gary S, 1974. "A Theory of Social Interactions," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(6), pages 1063-1093, Nov.-Dec..
    3. Stefano DellaVigna & John A. List & Ulrike Malmendier, 2012. "Testing for Altruism and Social Pressure in Charitable Giving," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(1), pages 1-56.
    4. Alpizar, Francisco & Carlsson, Fredrik & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2008. "Anonymity, reciprocity, and conformity: Evidence from voluntary contributions to a national park in Costa Rica," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(5-6), pages 1047-1060, June.
    5. Andreoni, James & Petrie, Ragan, 2004. "Public goods experiments without confidentiality: a glimpse into fund-raising," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(7-8), pages 1605-1623, July.
    6. Edward P. Lazear & Ulrike Malmendier & Roberto A. Weber, 2012. "Sorting in Experiments with Application to Social Preferences," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 136-163, January.
    7. Bernheim, B Douglas, 1994. "A Theory of Conformity," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(5), pages 841-877, October.
    8. Meer, Jonathan & Rosen, Harvey S., 2011. "The ABCs of charitable solicitation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(5-6), pages 363-371, June.
    9. Bruno S. Frey & Stephan Meier, 2004. "Social Comparisons and Pro-social Behavior: Testing "Conditional Cooperation" in a Field Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1717-1722, December.
    10. David Reinstein & Gerhard Riener, 2012. "Reputation and influence in charitable giving: an experiment," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 72(2), pages 221-243, February.
    11. repec:cup:judgdm:v:3:y:2008:i:8:p:595-606 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Glazer, Amihai & Konrad, Kai A, 1996. "A Signaling Explanation for Charity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(4), pages 1019-1028, September.
    13. repec:feb:natura:0059 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. repec:feb:framed:0087 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Broberg, Tomas & Ellingsen, Tore & Johannesson, Magnus, 2007. "Is generosity involuntary?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 94(1), pages 32-37, January.
    16. Dan Ariely & Anat Bracha & Stephan Meier, 2009. "Doing Good or Doing Well? Image Motivation and Monetary Incentives in Behaving Prosocially," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 544-555, March.
    17. Konow, James & Earley, Joseph, 2008. "The Hedonistic Paradox: Is homo economicus happier," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(1-2), pages 1-33, February.
    18. Rigdon, Mary & Ishii, Keiko & Watabe, Motoki & Kitayama, Shinobu, 2009. "Minimal social cues in the dictator game," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 358-367, June.
    19. Harbaugh, William T, 1998. "The Prestige Motive for Making Charitable Transfers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 277-282, May.
    20. Lara B. Aknin & Christopher P. Barrington-Leigh & Elizabeth W. Dunn & John F. Helliwell & Robert Biswas-Diener & Imelda Kemeza & Paul Nyende & Claire E. Ashton-James & Michael I. Norton, 2010. "Prosocial Spending and Well-Being: Cross-Cultural Evidence for a Psychological Universal," NBER Working Papers 16415, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Andreoni, James, 1989. "Giving with Impure Altruism: Applications to Charity and Ricardian Equivalence," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(6), pages 1447-1458, December.
    22. Andreoni, James, 1990. "Impure Altruism and Donations to Public Goods: A Theory of Warm-Glow Giving?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 100(401), pages 464-477, June.
    23. Jen Shang & Rachel Croson, 2009. "A Field Experiment in Charitable Contribution: The Impact of Social Information on the Voluntary Provision of Public Goods," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(540), pages 1422-1439, October.
    24. Small, Deborah A. & Loewenstein, George & Slovic, Paul, 2007. "Sympathy and callousness: The impact of deliberative thought on donations to identifiable and statistical victims," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 102(2), pages 143-153, March.
    25. Andreoni, James & Scholz, John Karl, 1998. "An Econometric Analysis of Charitable Giving with Interdependent Preferences," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 36(3), pages 410-428, July.
    26. Melissa Bateson & Daniel Nettle & Gilbert Roberts, 2006. "Cues of being watched enhance cooperation in a real-world setting," Natural Field Experiments 00214, The Field Experiments Website.
    27. Rege, Mari & Telle, Kjetil, 2004. "The impact of social approval and framing on cooperation in public good situations," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(7-8), pages 1625-1644, July.
    28. Jonathan Meer, "undated". "Brother Can You Spare a Dime? Peer Effects in Charitable Solicitation," Discussion Papers 08-035, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
    29. Bruno Frey & Stephan Meier, 2004. "In a field experiment," Natural Field Experiments 00243, The Field Experiments Website.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Brice Corgnet & Brian Gunia & Roberto Hernán González, 2021. "Harnessing the power of social incentives to curb shirking in teams," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(1), pages 139-167, February.
    2. Shoji, Masahiro, 2020. "Guilt and Antisocial Conformism: Experimental Evidence from Bangladesh," MPRA Paper 100735, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Abel, Martin & Brown, Willa, 2022. "Prosocial behavior in the time of COVID-19: The effect of private and public role models," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    4. Hanwen Chen & Siyi Liu & Xin Liu & Daoguang Yang, 2022. "Adversity Tries Friends: A Multilevel Analysis of Corporate Philanthropic Response to the Local Spread of COVID-19 in China," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 177(3), pages 585-612, May.
    5. Britta Butz & Christine Harbring, 2021. "The Effect of Disclosing Identities in a Socially Incentivized Public Good Game," Games, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-31, April.
    6. Vesely, Stepan & Klöckner, Christian A. & Carrus, Giuseppe & Chokrai, Parissa & Fritsche, Immo & Masson, Torsten & Panno, Angelo & Tiberio, Lorenza & Udall, Alina M., 2022. "Donations to renewable energy projects: The role of social norms and donor anonymity," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    7. Sasaki, Shusaku, 2019. "Majority size and conformity behavior in charitable giving: Field evidence from a donation-based crowdfunding platform in Japan," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 36-51.
    8. Yang, Lei & Manika, Danae & Athanasopoulou, Andromachi, 2020. "Are they sinners or saints? A multi-level investigation of hypocrisy in organisational and employee pro-environmental behaviours," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 336-347.
    9. Jay Simon, 2016. "On the existence of altruistic value and utility functions," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 81(3), pages 371-391, September.
    10. Jay L. Caulfield & Catharyn A. Baird & Felissa K. Lee, 2022. "The Ethicality of Point-of-Sale Marketing Campaigns: Normative Ethics Applied to Cause-Related Checkout Charities," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 175(4), pages 799-814, February.
    11. Britta Butz & Christine Harbring, 2022. "Tipping for charity: a field experiment in charitable giving on free walking tours," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 92(5), pages 781-808, July.
    12. Alt, Marius & Gallier, Carlo, 2022. "Incentives and intertemporal behavioral spillovers: A two-period experiment on charitable giving," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 959-972.
    13. Name-Correa, Alvaro J. & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2016. "“Giving” in to social pressure," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 99-116.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Diane Reyniers & Richa Bhalla, 2013. "Reluctant altruism and peer pressure in charitable giving," Judgment and Decision Making, Society for Judgment and Decision Making, vol. 8(1), pages 7-15, January.
    2. repec:cup:judgdm:v:8:y:2013:i:1:p:7-15 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Feine, Gregor & Groh, Elke D. & von Loessl, Victor & Wetzel, Heike, 2023. "The double dividend of social information in charitable giving: Evidence from a framed field experiment," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    4. Daniel Jones & Sera Linardi, 2014. "Wallflowers: Experimental Evidence of an Aversion to Standing Out," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(7), pages 1757-1771, July.
    5. Astrid Dannenberg & Olof Johansson‐Stenman & Heike Wetzel, 2022. "Status for the good guys: An experiment on charitable giving," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(2), pages 721-740, April.
    6. Name-Correa, Alvaro J. & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2016. "“Giving” in to social pressure," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 99-116.
    7. Feine, Gregor & Groh, Elke D. & von Loessl, Victor & Wetzel, Heike, 2021. "The double dividend of social information in charitable giving: Evidence from a framed field experiment," VfS Annual Conference 2021 (Virtual Conference): Climate Economics 242437, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    8. Bracha, Anat & Vesterlund, Lise, 2017. "Mixed signals: Charity reporting when donations signal generosity and income," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 24-42.
    9. Duffy, John & Kornienko, Tatiana, 2010. "Does competition affect giving?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 74(1-2), pages 82-103, May.
    10. Luca Zarri, 2013. "Altruism," Chapters, in: Luigino Bruni & Stefano Zamagni (ed.), Handbook on the Economics of Reciprocity and Social Enterprise, chapter 1, pages 9-19, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    11. Drouvelis, Michalis & Marx, Benjamin M., 2022. "Can charitable appeals identify and exploit belief heterogeneity?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 198(C), pages 631-649.
    12. Emel Filiz-Ozbay & Erkut Ozbay, 2014. "Effect of an audience in public goods provision," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 17(2), pages 200-214, June.
    13. David Klinowski, 2021. "Reluctant donors and their reactions to social information," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(2), pages 515-535, June.
    14. David Reinstein & Gerhard Riener, 2012. "Reputation and influence in charitable giving: an experiment," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 72(2), pages 221-243, February.
    15. Shreedhar, Ganga & Mourato, Susana, 2019. "Experimental Evidence on the Impact of Biodiversity Conservation Videos on Charitable Donations," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 180-193.
    16. Butera, Luigi & Horn, Jeffrey, 2020. "“Give less but give smart”: Experimental evidence on the effects of public information about quality on giving," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 171(C), pages 59-76.
    17. Jipeng Zhang & Huan Xie, 2019. "Hierarchy Leadership and Social Distance in Charitable Giving," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 86(2), pages 433-458, October.
    18. Kessler, Judd B. & Low, Corinne & Singhal, Monica, 2021. "Social policy instruments and the compliance environment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 192(C), pages 248-267.
    19. Anya Savikhin & Roman Sheremeta, 2010. "Visibility of Contributions and Cost of Information: An Experiment on Public Goods," Working Papers 10-22, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.
    20. Alpizar, Francisco & Carlsson, Fredrik & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2008. "Anonymity, reciprocity, and conformity: Evidence from voluntary contributions to a national park in Costa Rica," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(5-6), pages 1047-1060, June.
    21. Fang, Xing, 2022. "Why we hide good deeds? The selfless and anonymous donation behavior in crowdfunding," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    charitable giving; altruism; peer pressure; happiness;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J50 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:48779. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.