Wealthy People Give to Charity for Different Reasons Than the Rest of Us

The researchers’ first study examined the behavior of people who visited the website for The Life You Can Save, an organization that promotes charities dedicated to ending extreme poverty. Website visitors were asked to participate in a survey in exchange for a complimentary book, and a total of 185 (58% female) online visitors were successfully recruited for the study. The survey asked participants to report their gender, age, ethnicity, and household income. Participants then read one of two donation appeals. Half of the participants read an “agentic” appeal that characterized The Life You Can Save as an organization that spreads “knowledge of what each person can do individually to reduce poverty.” The other participants read a “communal” appeal that said the organization spreads “knowledge of what all of us can do together to reduce poverty.

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