Ferguson, E., & Lawrence, C.
Altruistic and warm-glow motivations: Differentiating first time from repeat donors
The conversion rate of first time donors to their second and third donation is low creating a significant problem to transfusion services. We hypothesise that feelings of warm-glow associated with donating blood, contribute to the differentiation between first time donors from those making second or third donations. To test this free-response motivations were examined a sample of 309 blood donors, categorised as first time donors and two categories of repeat donor: (1) those making their second or third donation and (2) those making their fourth or subsequent donation. We identified 33 categories of motivation for donating blood. Pure altruism and warm-glow were mentioned in the top 10 most frequent motivations. While pure altruism did not differentiate first time from the repeat donors, warm-glow did, with those making their second or third donations being 5 times more likely to express warm-glow and those making their fourth or subsequent donations 3 times more likely. These results add to the growing body of evidence that regular blood donors are more likely to express impure altruistic motives and that focusing on warm-glow interventions may offer the possibility to enhance the retention of blood donors.
Testing, Psychometrics, Methodology in Applied Psychology, 2019, Vol. 26, pp. 639-651, DOI: 10.4473/TPM26.4.10
