IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v315y2022ics0277953622007912.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Promoting blood donation through social media: Evidence from Brazil, India and the USA

Author

Listed:
  • Harrell, Stephen
  • Simons, Andrew M.
  • Clasen, Peter

Abstract

Social media has the potential to encourage prosocial behaviors at scale, yet very little causal evidence exists on the impact of related efforts. Blood donation is a particularly difficult, but essential prosocial behavior that is often critically undersupplied. We examine the effect of Facebook's blood donation tool on voluntary blood donation. We partnered with four major blood banks in the United States covering 363 collection facilities in 46 states and Washington, D.C. We tracked the tool's impact on blood donations during its staggered rollout on a sample of more than 47,000 facility-date observations from March 2019 to September 2019. The tool caused an increase of 0.55 total donations per facility per day (+4.0% [95% CI: 0.04%–8.0%]), and an increase of 0.15 donations from first-time donors per facility per day (+18.9% [95% CI: 4.7%–33.1%]). Longitudinal evidence from Brazil and India suggests the share of donors who both received a message from the tool and stated they were influenced by Facebook to donate increased from 0% to 14.1% [95% CI: 12.1%–16.2%] in the first year of the tool's deployment (i.e., September 2018 to August 2019). These meaningful increases, especially from first-time donors, demonstrate that social media platforms can play an important role in fostering offline prosocial behaviors that benefit the health and well-being of societies around the world.

Suggested Citation

  • Harrell, Stephen & Simons, Andrew M. & Clasen, Peter, 2022. "Promoting blood donation through social media: Evidence from Brazil, India and the USA," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 315(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:315:y:2022:i:c:s0277953622007912
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115485
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953622007912
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115485?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Goette, Lorenz & Stutzer, Alois, 2020. "Blood donations and incentives: Evidence from a field experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 52-74.
    2. Nicola Lacetera & Mario Macis & Robert Slonim, 2012. "Will There Be Blood? Incentives and Displacement Effects in Pro-social Behavior," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 186-223, February.
    3. Ammar Redza Ahmad Rizal & Shahrina Md Nordin & Wan Fatimah Wan Ahmad & Muhammad Jazlan Ahmad Khiri & Siti Haslina Hussin, 2022. "How Does Social Media Influence People to Get Vaccinated? The Elaboration Likelihood Model of a Person’s Attitude and Intention to Get COVID-19 Vaccines," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(4), pages 1-20, February.
    4. Lacetera, Nicola & Macis, Mario, 2010. "Social image concerns and prosocial behavior: Field evidence from a nonlinear incentive scheme," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 225-237, November.
    5. Theresa Kuchler & Dominic Russel & Johannes Stroebel, 2020. "The Geographic Spread of COVID-19 Correlates with the Structure of Social Networks as Measured by Facebook," NBER Working Papers 26990, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Nicola Lacetera & Mario Macis, 2013. "Time for Blood: The Effect of Paid Leave Legislation on Altruistic Behavior," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 29(6), pages 1384-1420, December.
    7. A. Colin Cameron & Douglas L. Miller, 2015. "A Practitioner’s Guide to Cluster-Robust Inference," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 50(2), pages 317-372.
    8. Iajya, Victor & Lacetera, Nicola & Macis, Mario & Slonim, Robert, 2013. "The effects of information, social and financial incentives on voluntary undirected blood donations: Evidence from a field experiment in Argentina," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 214-223.
    9. Nicola Lacetera & Mario Macis & Robert Slonim, 2014. "Rewarding Volunteers: A Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(5), pages 1107-1129, May.
    10. Kirk Kristofferson & Katherine White & John Peloza, 2014. "The Nature of Slacktivism: How the Social Observability of an Initial Act of Token Support Affects Subsequent Prosocial Action," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 40(6), pages 1149-1166.
    11. John A. List, 2011. "The Market for Charitable Giving," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 25(2), pages 157-180, Spring.
    12. Goette, Lorenz & Tripodi, Egon, 2020. "Does positive feedback of social impact motivate prosocial behavior? A field experiment with blood donors," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 1-8.
    13. Robert M. Bond & Christopher J. Fariss & Jason J. Jones & Adam D. I. Kramer & Cameron Marlow & Jaime E. Settle & James H. Fowler, 2012. "A 61-million-person experiment in social influence and political mobilization," Nature, Nature, vol. 489(7415), pages 295-298, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Goette, Lorenz & Stutzer, Alois, 2020. "Blood donations and incentives: Evidence from a field experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 52-74.
    2. Sun, Tianshu & Lu, Susan Feng & Jin, Ginger Zhe, 2016. "Solving shortage in a priceless market: Insights from blood donation," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 149-165.
    3. Joan Costa-Font & Mireia Jofre-Bonet & Steven T. Yen, 2013. "Not All Incentives Wash Out the Warm Glow: The Case of Blood Donation Revisited," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 66(4), pages 529-551, November.
    4. Bruhin, Adrian & Goette, Lorenz & Haenni, Simon & Jiang, Lingqing, 2020. "Spillovers of prosocial motivation: Evidence from an intervention study on blood donors," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    5. Iajya, Victor & Lacetera, Nicola & Macis, Mario & Slonim, Robert, 2013. "The effects of information, social and financial incentives on voluntary undirected blood donations: Evidence from a field experiment in Argentina," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 214-223.
    6. Tianshu Sun & Guodong (Gordon) Gao & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2019. "Mobile Messaging for Offline Group Formation in Prosocial Activities: A Large Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(6), pages 2717-2736, June.
    7. Tanjim Hossain & King King Li, 2014. "Crowding Out in the Labor Market: A Prosocial Setting Is Necessary," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(5), pages 1148-1160, May.
    8. Ashley C. Craig & Ellen Garbarino & Stephanie A. Heger & Robert Slonim, 2017. "Waiting To Give: Stated and Revealed Preferences," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(11), pages 3672-3690, November.
    9. Guodong Gao & Tianshu Sun & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2015. "Mobile Messaging for Offline Social Interactions: A Large Field Expeiment," Natural Field Experiments 00571, The Field Experiments Website.
    10. Tianshu Sun & Susan Feng Lu & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2015. "Solving Shortage in a Priceless Market: Insights from Blood Donation," NBER Working Papers 21312, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Tianshu Sun & Guodong (Gordon) Gao & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2015. "Mobile Messaging for Offline Group Formation in Prosocial Activities: A Large Field Experiment," NBER Working Papers 21704, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Goette, Lorenz & Tripodi, Egon, 2024. "The limits of social recognition: Experimental evidence from blood donors," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 231(C).
    13. Christine Exley, 2018. "Incentives for Prosocial Behavior: The Role of Reputations," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(5), pages 2460-2471, May.
    14. Huber, Laura Rosendahl & Sloof, Randolph & Van Praag, Mirjam, 2017. "The effect of incentives on sustainable behavior: evidence from a field experiment," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 92-106.
    15. Christine Exley, 2013. "Incentives for Prosocial Behavior: The Role of Reputations," Discussion Papers 12-022, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
    16. Victor Iajya & Nicola Lacetera & Mario Macis & Robert Slonim, 2012. "The Effects of Information, Social and Economic Incentives on Voluntary Undirected Blood Donations: Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial in Argentina," NBER Working Papers 18630, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Nicola Lacetera & Mario Macis & Robert Slonim, 2014. "Rewarding Volunteers: A Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(5), pages 1107-1129, May.
    18. Timothy Gubler & Ian Larkin & Lamar Pierce, 2016. "Motivational Spillovers from Awards: Crowding Out in a Multitasking Environment," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(2), pages 286-303, April.
    19. Slonim, Robert & Wang, Carmen, 2016. "Market Design for Altruistic Supply: Evidence from the Lab," IZA Discussion Papers 9650, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Ashraf, Nava & Bandiera, Oriana & Jack, B. Kelsey, 2014. "No margin, no mission? A field experiment on incentives for public service delivery," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 1-17.

    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:eee:socmed:v:315:y:2022:i:c:s0277953622007912. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    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.