TITLE:
The Effect of Anchoring on Charitable Donations
AUTHORS:
Tianyi Zhang
KEYWORDS:
Anchoring Effect, Charity, Donations, Charitable Giving
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.12 No.10,
October
22,
2024
ABSTRACT: This paper examines the effect of anchoring on donation intentions by individuals, aiming to verify whether the anchoring technique has a significant effect in persuading individuals to donate to charity. The study first conducts a literature review on past research aimed at encouraging charitable giving as well as papers investigating the use of anchoring as a method of intervention in changing behavior. An experiment was conducted with 80 random online participants who were randomly assigned to either the control or experimental group. Those in the control group saw a normal advertisement from a non-profit organization, while those in the experimental group saw a modified advertisement with an anchor donation amount from the same non-profit organization. Results show no significant difference between the willingness to donate between the control and experimental groups. However, a difference in participants’ intended donation amount can be seen and will likely be statistically significant with a larger sample size.