International Charities:
How donor´s cultural characteristics influence
donating behavior
What cultural factors influence the willingness to donate,
height en type of donation and preferred type of charity?
Faculty of Economics and Business
Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
Author: Marlous de Beus
MSc International Business & Management
1
stCorrector: F.M. de Poel
2nd Corrector: B.J. Pennink
18
thof August 2011
Abstract
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Table of Content
1 Introduction p. 3
2 Donating Behavior and Culture in previous Theory p. 5
2.1 Basic Theories: religion, Hofstede and Trompenaars p. 7 2.2 The three donor decisions p. 10 2.3 Donor decision 1: the decision whether or not to donate p. 12 2.4 Donor decision 2: the decision on height and type of donation p. 14 2.5 Donor decision 3: the decision on type of charity to donate to p. 16 2.6 Conclusion and Conceptual Model p. 18
3 Methodology p. 19 3.1 Data Collection p. 19 3.2 Variables p. 20 3.3 Scores Translated p. 20 3.4 Statistical Testing p. 23 3.5 Conclusion on Methodology p. 23
4. Results of the research p. 23
4.1 Results on Donor Decision 1: the decision whether or not to donate p. 24 4.2 Results on Donor Decision 2: the decision on height and type of donation p. 26 4.3 Results on Donor Decision 3: the decision on which type of charity to donate to p. 28 4.4 Recap table Correlation and Regression p. 32 4.6 What do these results say? p. 33
5 Discussion and Limitations p. 34
5.1 Discussion on findings: confirmed hypotheses p. 35 5.2 Discussion on findings: deviations from expectancies p. 35 5.3 Managerial consequences of results p. 42
5.4 Limitations p. 43
5.5 Possibilities for future research p. 44
6 Conclusion p. 45
Acknowledgements p. 46
Bibliography p. 46
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1.
Introduction
Once upon a time, there was a little girl, named Alice. After following a White Rabbit through a rabbit hole, she entered a world in which everything was odd. Odd, because it was not as she felt it should be. Odd, because this could not possibly be the way people were supposed to behave. And mostly odd, because she wasn’t supposed to be that far from home, but by the way people acted, she might as well be at the other side of the globe. The famous story of Alice in Wonderland perfectly reflects the way individuals from different cultures see each other. Each culture sees the world in their own unique way, having their own standards and their own values. However, nowadays there are many ways in which the world is trying to span the distance between cultures. Individuals want to experience different cultures. Corporations operate in many different cultures, not unlike the White Rabbit, living both in the normal world and in Wonderland, but very confused as to how he should behave in both. These corporations are the focus of this research. To be even more specific, this research entails corporations operating in the world of gifts, help and persuasions. The main topic of this report are international charities. As Alice experienced in the peculiar world of Wonderland, doing good and being charitable is not perceived in the same way everywhere. The inhabitants of Wonderland tried to help Alice in many ways during her endeavors, however, as she understood none of them, she did not perceive this as help. On her turn, Alice tried to be friendly and help various inhabitants of Wonderland, however, this did not come across as friendly with the inhabitants. Charity is perceived differently in different parts of the world and corporations operating in the world of international charity need to find these differences and act upon them, if they want to be successful in trying to span the gap between their ´Normal World´ and ´Wonderland´.
International charities are not often considered in the international business literature. However, international charities are an integral part of the international business environment, because, according to Wunderink (2002), they form a part of the public domain. This public domain is seen by most people as being an integral part of society and the things that this encompasses, such as schools, health care, protection for the weaker parts of society, development of medicines and protection of environment/wildlife, are often considered important by members of that society (Wunderink, 2002). The definition of a charity, as taken from Wunderink (2002), is ´a non-profit
corporate body whose goals are charitable, cultural, scientific or some other public goal, who make an appeal to the public liberality. The money received consists only of voluntary contributions, with no compensation. No rights can be derived from contributions’. Their main shared characteristic is the
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generic firms, they do suffer from the same problems as these generic firms. If we take this to the international level, international charities suffer from the same challenges as generic MNCs, such as cultural differences among donors, the local responsiveness/global integration issue and information asymmetry (Gooderham and Nordhaug, 2003). Furthermore, Calmette and Kilkenny (2002) find that international charities as a whole suffer from agency problems, due to the high level of information asymmetry, just like generic international firms.
This thesis and the research presented will be part of the stream of research done on individual charities, rather than inter-country charity. It specifies towards individual charities and the donor´s cultural characteristics that determine donating behavior. This research will investigate if and how cultural characteristics determine three main aspects of donating behavior: the decision whether or not to donate; the decision on height and type of donation and the decision on type of charity to donate to.
When looking at the existing literature, which will be elaborately done in the literature review, there is already some literature on the topic of charities and donor characteristics that influence giving (Sherry (1983), Wunderink (2002), Nelsen et al (2006) and Konow (2010)). This is, however, not complete. What is missing in the current literature is, first of all, an international focus. This means that culture is not yet taken into account when looking at the donating behavior of people, while this is an integral aspect of the fundraising determinants of international charities. This research addresses this by focusing on the cultural characteristics of (potential) donors and how these influence their donating behavior. Furthermore, there are multiple aspects to the donating behavior of people, which have so far only been addressed separately in the current literature (Sherry (1983), Wunderink (2002), Konow (2010), Ramirez and Saraoglu (2011)). These multiple aspects together form the actual donating behavior of people. This research specifies three determinants of the donating behavior, from now on named ‘the three donor decisions’: the decision whether or not to
donate, the decision on the height and type (structural or ad hoc) of the donation and the decision to which type of charity to donate to. This third donor decision has not been researched in this form
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1) Humanitarian charities Charities like the Red Cross or Amnesty International that focus on helping humans, either by helping the unfortunate, such as disaster management and foreign aid or by fighting or researching human diseases, such as AIDS or cancer.
2) Animal-welfare charities Charities like the WSPA or the SPCA that focus on helping animals
in need or fighting animal cruelty
3) Nature-preserving charities Charities like the WWF or Greenpeace that focus on preserving and bettering the natural world, for both human and animal.
Table 1: Types of charities presented
It is expected that these three main causes of charities will help in determining what effect culture might have on the third donating decision, the decision on type of charity to donate to.
To recap, the main goal of this research is to research which cultural characteristics might influence the mentioned three aspects of donating behavior and how. This leads to the following main question to be answered through this research:
‘Do cultural characteristics influence the donating behavior of individuals towards charities?
2.
Donating behavior and culture in previous research
Earlier research of Sherry (1983) already indicated that situational characteristics influence the charitable behavior or people, whether it is towards individuals or charities. Other research has shown the influence of characteristics like religion (Samad and Glenn, 2010), heritage and governmental incentives (Wilhelm et al., 2008) on donating behavior. Thus, earlier research has already found that people’s individual characteristics can influence (parts of) their donating behavior. An important gap in this research, however, can be found in the cultural characteristics of individuals that influence the donating behavior. This has not been researched up until now. Culture is defined as individuals´ shared perception of their social environment which can reflect stable traits that result
in almost automatic processing when cultural members discern what behaviors or principles are desirable (Nelsen et al, 2006). There are two leading authors when it comes to studies of culture:
Hofstede (2001) and Trompenaars (with co-author Hampden-Turner, 1998). Both authors have developed dimensions of culture, indicating in which aspects cultures can be measured and differ from one another. For this research, a combination of the theory presented by these two authors will be used. This means that certain aspects of culture, if found in literature to be potentially influencing the donating behavior, will be included, while others will be disregarded. Furthermore, one other aspect is inserted as an influence on donating behavior: religion. All three groups of influences on donating behavior will be explained, but first it is necessary to give a short overview of the existing theory on international charities as a whole.
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characteristics, such as that done by Alesina and Weder (2002), who find that the level of corruptness in a country does not lower its international aid received and by Cashel-Cordo and Craig (1997) who find that funds given as charity to lesser-developed countries are often used for targets that were non-intended by the fund-giver, known as aid-fungibility. Furthermore, charity might harm the self-help that the recipient countries have, as also shown by Cashel-Cordo and Craig (1997), who found significant evidence of an inverse relationship between the number of grants that a country gets and the tax revenues that that same country generates on its own. Many reports of organizations such as the IMF and the World Bank focus on these same issues. In this line of research, the focus is often on the effect that recipient characteristics have on the charity received (Cashel-Cordo and Craig, 1997; Alesina and Weder, 2002).
However, there are also researchers looking at the other side of the coin. They focus on donor characteristics rather than receiver characteristics. Especially when looking at research concerning individual charities, this shift is seen. These individual charities have to raise funds in order to help their cause and survive, but they have to do this without selling a product (Wunderink, 2002). Raising funds without a product to sell, means being subjected to people’s empathy and willingness to help a charity. That is why we see that, when focus is shifted to individual charities and individual donors rather than inter-country charity, literature focuses more on the characteristics of the donor, rather than the recipient. Wunderink (2002) researched the donating behavior of 500 Dutch households and found that demographic and social factors such as age, income and level of empathy with a cause influence the decision to donate, but not the amount. The amount of money given is mostly influenced by the way of giving (if it is an ad-hoc gift, the amounts are lower than in case of structural gifts) and opinions on the way a charity uses the money. Furthermore, gender seems to play a role in the decision to donate (Kamas et al, 2008). These authors found in individual giving that women were more prone to giving and to giving more than men. When pairs of individuals were asked to make decisions on giving money away, mixed-sex couples gave the most and all-male couples the least, suggesting that gender does play a role. Another aspect here was social acceptance, which is an important determinant of the donating behavior, especially if the other part of the pair was more charitable than the other (Kamas et al, 2008). When talking about individual donations, altruism plays an important role. Altruism is defined as ‘the selfless concern for the welfare of others’ (Konow, 2009) and indicates the willingness to give completely selflessly without getting anything in return. Pure altruism is rare, as most people donate to make themselves feel better about themselves or to settle their conscience by knowing the receiver is doing something good with the gift or has earned it (Wunderink, 2002). That is even why some authors argue that charities do sell a product: a warm glow that comes from giving to a good cause (Sherry, 1983) and that this is actually what people ‘buy’ when making a donation, indicating no pure altruism. There are, however, experiments that show that in some cases pure altruism is present. Kamas et al (2008), conducted the so-called dictator game, often used to test altruism. In this game, one person gets a sum of money and can choose to give some away to an anonymous recipient. They showed that there is still a small percentage, mostly women, that give all the money away, without them knowing anything about the recipient. Wunderink (2002) showed with this same experiment that the number of donors and the individual amount of money given away is larger when the recipient is said to be a charity and even more when the recipient is a named, well-known charity.
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the effect that culture has on the donating behavior of individuals. That is why at this point, after introducing the basic theory on charities and donating behavior, a narrower scope will be introduced in this research, in order to draw your attention to the topic around which this research centers, starting with the best-known theory on culture, its determinants and how this might affect donating behavior.
2.1 Basic theories: religion, Hofstede and Trompenaars
To study the available theory on culture and its effect on donating behavior in a structured manner, some choices had to be made. First of all, the aspects of culture used in this research, are limited. There are two leading authors, Hofstede and Trompenaars, that see culture as being the sum of several different factors. Culture is not a singular organism, but is composed out of multiple facets, which combined define culture. These facets are called cultural dimensions. For this research, Hofstede’s dimensions (Hofstede (1993) and Hofstede (2001)) and Trompenaars’ dimensions (Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner, 1998) will be used as a measure of culture. Hofstede and Trompenaars are the leading authors when it comes to the classification of national cultures, that is why they were chosen. However, one thing is missing from their dimensions, which can play a role in the donating behavior of individuals, and this is religion (Samad and Glenn, 2010). These authors state that each religion has their own way of encouraging or mandating charitable giving to their followers, which can contribute to the decision to donate. Therefore, this dimension was added to run parallel to those of Hofstede and Trompenaars. Both sets of cultural dimensions and the parallel dimension of religion will be introduced shortly.
The first and probably best-known author on cultural dimension is Hofstede. Geert Hofstede, already in 1980, came with a model defining culture as consisting of 5 main dimensions. These dimensions are often used to classify cultures, and are most commonly seen as portraying the difference between national cultures (Hofstede, 2001). His research is based on a worldwide study of
employees at IBM executed between 1967 and 1973, as part of a personnel survey on national value differences between the subsidiaries in different countries. Being an anthropologist, Hofstede knew that there are four main problem areas in which cultures differ: their perception of inequality, their way of coping with uncertainty, the relationship between the individual and his primary group and the implications of being born as a boy or a girl.1 He translated this into four dimensions: Power Distance, Uncertainty Avoidance, Individualism and Masculinity vs Femininity. His model was later broadened to include a fifth dimension, Long-term vs Short-term Orientation. Over the years, as many as 66 countries and three regions were classified by ways of the 5 dimensions of Hofstede.2 The 5 dimensions, as defined by Hofstede are explained and interpreted in Table 2.
1
http://www.geerthofstede.nl/
2
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Dimension Interpretation
Power Distance Power distance describes the inequality of
individuals within a culture and the acceptation of this. Countries with a high power distance have a high level of inequality and this is seen as normal by the individuals within this culture. Hierarchy is important. In countries with low power distance, democratic decision-making is normal. Individuals see each other more as equal, regardless of formal positions. Individualism vs Collectivism This dimension shows the degree to which
people are integrated into groups. Individuals from collectivistic cultures see themselves as part of their in-group rather than an individual. The collective need is more important than the individual needs. Individuals from individualistic countries perceive themselves as individuals and not as part of a group.
Uncertainty Avoidance Shows the tolerance that a culture has for uncertainty. Cultures with high uncertainty avoidance feel anxiety when confronted with uncertainty, while cultures with low uncertainty avoidance do not need to eliminate all
uncertainty.
Masculinity vs Femininity Describes a culture’s perception of what is valued most in life. A masculine culture values achievement, materialism and power, while a feminine culture values relationships and the quality of life.
Long-term vs Short-term Orientation This dimension describes a culture’s time horizon. In long-term oriented cultures, the future is valued most. These societies value rewards, adaptation and saving. Short-term oriented cultures value the past and the present. Important values are: respect for tradition, saving one’s face, fulfillment of social obligations.
Table 2: Hofstede’s dimensions explained
Source: information from Hofstede, 2001
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research. The most recent results of the research, including some new countries that were added later, can be found on the website of Hofstede 3
Another classification of cultures was done by Trompenaars, of which the results were first published in 1993 and revised in 1998 (Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner, 1998). Trompenaars developed his own framework of cultural dimensions, based on survey distributed under managers from 100 different countries. The purpose of this research was to help managers structure their cross-cultural experiences and develop competencies to do business across cultures. His survey consisted of many questions, and identified common factors or underlying themes. From these, he phrased 7
dimensions (displayed and interpreted in Table 3). All dimensions are phrased as a ‘versus’
statement, meaning that a low score indicates a position on the left side of the scale (corresponding with the aspect left of ‘vs’) and a high score indicates a position on the right side of the scale
(corresponding with the aspect right of ‘vs’). Some of his dimensions resemble those of Hofstede, but others are an addition to his research.
Dimension Interpretation
Universalism vs Particularism Where lies the highest value within a society: with rules or relationships?
Individualism vs Collectivism Do members of a society perceive themselves as an individual or as a member of a larger group? Neutral vs Emotional Is the showing of emotions considered ‘normal’
within a society (emotional) or not (neutral)? Specific vs Diffuse Is there a separation of work and private life in
the society (specific) or are these mixed (diffuse)?
Achievement vs Ascription How a society determines status. Can status be won by proving oneself (achievement) or is it given at birth and fixed (ascription)?
Sequential vs Synchronic How does a society treat time? Is it a series of events that are separate (sequential) or are past, present and future linked (synchronic)?
Internal vs External control Does a society believe the environment can be controlled (internal locus of control) or are they controlled by the environment (external locus of control)
Table 3: Trompenaars’ dimensions explained
Source: information from Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1998)
Each of these dimensions determines one aspect of a national culture. Not all dimensions out of both sets will be relevant for this research. The literature review will make a distinction between those dimensions that will be used and those that are obsolete. The reasons behind the usage of each dimension in the combination with donating behavior will be thoroughly explained in the rest of this literature section.
Next to the cultural dimensions presented above, there is another aspect that is expected to be a strong determinant of donating behavior, which is religion (Samad and Glenn, 2010). Religion is inserted, not so much as a dimension of culture, as this is not the case, but more as a parallel running
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next to culture. Religion forms a whole new set of rules, regulations, expectations and boundaries that people are asked to adhere to. These rules can be part of their main culture, but can also run parallel to the main culture of an individual. For example, a Muslim from the USA might have certain rules in its faith, such as the offering of Zakah, a mandatory offering of a part of an individual’s income and wealth to the poor (Samad and Glenn, 2010), while his main culture, which is American, might think these mandatory gifts of charity are completely unnecessary. This creates friction
between an individual’s culture and it’s religion, both of which will influence the donating behavior of this individual.
When talking about religion, there are two main streams: the monotheism and the polytheism. Monotheistic faiths, such as Christianity, Judaism and the Islam, believe in one god, while polytheistic faiths, such as Buddhism, Hinduism and the ancient Greek and Roman belief systems, believe there to be multiple gods, most often these gods are connected to one aspect of nature. The fact that the polytheistic faiths have their roots more directly into nature-worshipping, means that they give more importance to nature than monotheistic faiths (Rinehart, 2004). Furthermore, the process of
reincarnation, that some major polytheistic faiths believe in, brings with it a difference between polytheistic and monotheistic religions when it comes to viewing animals: through reincarnation, each animal could have been or might become a human in another life. This leads to a higher level of respect for nature and animals than is in monotheistic faiths.
It is expected that the donating behavior of individuals can be (partly) explained by the above presented cultural dimensions and religion. Their effect is thought to be dispersed: not every factor will influence the complete donating behavior. Each relevant factor will be examined and its potential affect on the relevant donor decision explained.
2.2 The three donor decisions
While this report has already mentioned the three donor decisions often, they have not been adequately addressed yet. And before looking at the effect that the cultural dimensions and religion have on these donor decisions, the reasoning behind their existence needs to be given. The reason behind their existence stems from a concept that is often used in research, even already in this one, which is dissection. As was shown in the previous paragraph, culture consists of many different layers which together make up the concept ‘culture’. By dissecting the concept ‘culture’ into different parts it becomes more manageable to work with this concept and it becomes easier to pick out certain aspects of the concept that might be more influential or more explanatory than others. Both Hofstede (2001) and Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1998) used these facets to better explain the concept of culture. This principle is also used here, with the concept ‘donating behavior’. Donating behavior as such is a broad principle, that would be quite more manageable if it was lit in different facets. Many authors have already done this, without specifying this: Wunderink (2002) uses two layers of donating behavior for her research, which are the factors influencing the probability of a donation and those influencing the height of the donation, including which type of donation it is; Nelson et al (2006) specify their research towards the factors influencing the
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research, a framework was made, identifying three aspects of donating behavior, from now on called the ‘donor decisions’: decisions that donors make regarding donating that together constitute their total donating behavior. Each of these three donor decisions will hereby be defined and funded into the existing literature.
2.2.1 Donor Decision 1
The donor decision that has been most extensively researched, is the first donor decision, here called ‘The decision whether or not to donate’. The motives behind donating or, more broadly, giving in general, have been researched extensively (by Sherry (1983); Andreoni (1989); Eson and Webb (1991); Wunderink (2002); Konow (2009) among others). This decision is an important one and is set as the first donor decision, as this decision determines whether or not the second and third donor decision are even relevant: if an individual decides not to make a donation, the other two donor decisions are rendered obsolete.
2.2.2 Donor Decision 2
The second donor decision is one that consists out of two aspect: the height of the donation and the type of the donation. This combination was made, based on the research of Wunderink (2002), who looks at the height of charitable donations of Dutch households and finds that this is connected to the type of the donation. Two types of donations are specified, also based on Wunderink (2002): the structural donation and the ad hoc donation. A structural donation is a donation that is made on a regular basis. This basis is not specified per time period: both a weekly donation and a yearly
donation are considered structural, as long as it is perceived as being part of, what Wunderink (2002) calls, an individual’s mental accounting system. The decision on height and type of a donation are two decisions that can be made parallel to each other: it is not expected that in all cases one precedes the other. Some individuals might already know which amount of money they want to donate and then decide on how to donate this, while others might decide on a type of donation and see what amount of money can be spend if that type of donation is chosen. Therefore, the title of donor decision 2, the ‘Decision on height and type of donation’, does not reflect the order in which these decisions might take place.
2.2.3 Donor Decision 3
Another aspect of donating behavior is choosing a particular charity to donate to. Ramirez and Saraoglu (2011) are one of the few authors found that devote their research to this decision. However, it is a decision that needs to be made by potential donors, as without a cause, there is nothing to donate to. The fact that it is named the ‘third donor decision’, does not reflect its place in the sequence chronologically: here, once again, this decision can run parallel to donor decision 2, sometimes even to donor decision 1 and its place in the decision making sequence differs per person. The research of Ramirez and Saraoglu (2011) focuses on developing a framework of what charity individuals choose when confronted with alternatives from the same cause. That decision, however, is highly pragmatic and incorporates issues such as administrative efficiency, corporate governance and sustainability of a charity’s activities. As this research is about the effects that culture have on an individual’s behavior, it might be more prudent to broaden this topic into a donor decision on type of
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more aspects that are sensitive to cultural differences. As mentioned in the introduction, charities will be divided into three main types:
- Humanitarian charities - Animal-welfare charities - Nature-preserving charities
2.2.4 Concluding the three donor decisions
The three donor decisions combined constitute the donating behavior of an individual: it determines their actual donations to charities. Note that this paragraph has only addressed the definition of each decision and its foundations in the existing literature. The specific effects that culture and religion have on each of these decisions ask for a more elaborate approach, in which particular dimensions of culture and religion will be coupled with the donor decisions based on existing literature, starting with donor decision 1.
2.3 Donor decision 1: The decision whether or not to donate
Individuals donate to charities for a number of reasons, researched thoroughly in sociologic
literature. Konow (2009) researched the motives and institutional factors that influence giving in the broadest sense of the word, so that includes charitable gifts, gifts to friends, gifts to strangers etc. The premise of his research is that the motive for gift-giving is rooted in feelings: giving a gift can result in good feelings, especially when the recipient is a charity, or in bad feelings, if the recipient is someone the donor did not intend to give the gift to. It was previously hypothesized that donors mostly give because of the so called ‘warm glow’ (Sherry, 1983), a positive feeling that is created by the giving of a gift. This feeling, according to Sherry (1983) is one of the main reasons that people give, leading to the so called ‘impure altruism’ (Andreoni, 1989). Altruism is defined as ‘a helping behavior that is motivated by a selfless concern for the welfare of another person’4. There are two types of altruism: pure altruism and impure altruism. Pure altruism is altruism in its purest form, so according to the definition given above. Impure altruism, however, is altruism motivated by a
combination of a selfless concern for others and selfish motives, such as the creation of a warm glow (Andreoni, 1989). Konow (2009) adds to this the distinction between unconditional and conditional altruism, which is determined by the level of consideration for social norms in the gift-giving. Unconditional altruism neglects the consideration of social norms and this form includes pure altruism, the warm glow and impure altruism. Furthermore, there is another form, the conditional altruism, which is dependent on social norms. This form of gift-giving can be shaped by feelings of inequity, reciprocity or need fulfillment, and it is therefore done because it is ‘the right thing to do’. As many research as is done into why people give, there is little research as to the question which cultural characteristics determine the likelihood for donation in an individual. This is where the cultural dimensions of Hofstede and Trompenaars come in. Starting with Hofstede (1993), when looking at the cultural dimensions that he phrased, there are some that could potentially influence the decision to donate or not. One of these aspects is the cultural dimension of masculinity vs
femininity (as mentioned in Hofstede, 2001). A masculine culture is more assertive and more focused
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on the ego, while feminine cultures are more nurturing and focused on social bonds (Hofstede, 2001). Nelsen et al (2006) investigate the impact of charity advertising on both males and females in a masculine and a feminine culture. They find that one aspect influencing the decision to donate is an individual’s perception of responsibility for care: in feminine countries, the government is seen as the one responsible for helping minorities or charities, while in masculine countries, individuals
themselves are seen as being responsible for helping these groups (Brooks, 2002). In other words: masculine cultures have a higher feeling of personal responsibility, while feminine cultures rely more on institutional responsibility. This influences the moral obligation that individuals feel for donating to a charity: in masculine countries this moral obligation is higher, as the responsibility for helping a charity is put with the individual, not with the government (Brooks, 2002). This leads to the first hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1.1: Individuals from masculine cultures will more often decide to donate to charity than individuals from feminine cultures.
A second aspect from Hofstede’s theory that could influence the decision to donate, is the individualism vs collectivism dimension. This dimension, combined with the social pressure that people experience for donating, might influence the decision whether or not to donate. Kamas et al (2008) found in their research that social acceptance is an important determinant of donating behavior. If a culture is a highly collectivistic one, people might feel pressure from their in-group when it comes to donating behavior: if no one within the group donates, they might be less inclined to donate, while if many people from the in-group donate, the pressure for social acceptance might make an individual a charity donor. In individualistic countries, social pressure is lower, as individuals reason from their own perspective, rather than from that of the group they belong to (Hofstede, 2001). This is why it is believed that the higher social pressure of a collectivistic culture can influence the donating behavior, however how this influences the decision to donate can not be determined, as this depends on the attitude of the in-group. This leads to the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1.2: The level of collectivism vs individualism of a country will influence the donating behavior, but the direction in which it influences it is unknown.
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willing to accept that their small, individual donation can indeed make a difference. From this flows the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1.3: Individuals from cultures with an internal locus of control are more likely to donate to a charity than individuals from a culture with an external locus of control.
Parallel to the cultural dimensions influencing the decision whether or not to give, runs religion, which also plays a role in this decision, mostly because of the rules on charitable giving. Each religion preaches to give charitable gifts to those in need, some more strongly than others. Islamic faith, for example, has the tradition of Zakah, which is a mandatory charitable gift of a certain percentage of income or wealth (Eson and Webb, 1991; Samad and Glenn, 2010). The other monotheistic religions, Christianity and Judaism, do preach charity, but do not demand a mandatory charitable gift. Judaism does have a part of the scripture explicitly saying that charity should be practiced, but that is the extent of it. (Samad and Glenn, 2010). The polytheistic faiths do preach charity, but are more focused on the spiritual and attitudinal form of charity than on the monetary charity. (Eson and Webb, 1991). Religion, therefore, could also be seen as a factor influencing the decision whether or not to donate to a charity. This leads to the last hypothesis on this donor decision, hypothesis 1.4:
Hypothesis 1.4: Practitioners of a belief that dictates rules for charitable giving, such as the Islam, will sooner donate than practitioners of faiths that don’t dictate this, such as Christianity or a polytheistic faith.
The above mentioned hypotheses will test the factors influencing the decision whether or not to
donate. The expectation is that the cultural factors influencing this decision can be found in the
masculinity vs femininity dimension of Hofstede (1993), social pressure coupled with the
individualism vs collectivism dimension of Hofstede (1993), the dimension of internal vs external locus of control, as presented by Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1998) and religion. The next sections will move on to the cultural aspects influencing the other two donor decisions: the decision on height and type of donation and the decision on type of charity to donate to.
2.4 Donor decision 2: The decision on height and type of donation
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others give more. This is the famous ‘Keeping up with the Jones’’ syndrome. The study of van Ootegem, 1995 (cited in Wunderink, 2002), results in the conclusion that the most prevailing type of donor is the individualist, meaning that the height of a donation is a personal choice and not
influenced by other donors.
When looking at the cultural dimensions of both Hofstede and Trompenaars, it shows that several of these might influence the decision on the height and type of donation. First of all, when considering the type of donation, structural or ad hoc, it is expected that Hofstede’s dimension of Uncertainty Avoidance will influence this decision (Hofstede, 1993). The dimension of Uncertainty Avoidance shows the level in which individuals from a certain culture try to avoid uncertainty in their lives. Individuals from a culture with a high uncertainty avoidance do not like uncertainty and will want as much certainty in life as possible, shying away from things that will create uncertainty. (Hofstede, 2001). When taking this to the donor decisions, it is expected that people from cultures with a high level of uncertainty avoidance will prefer to give a structural donation. This is because structural donations are, according to Wunderink (2002), made part of the monthly expenses, which means that they are expenses that are sure and calculated into the household accounting system. This creates a high level of certainty and stability. Individuals from countries with a low level of
uncertainty avoidance will not shy uncertainty as much (Hofstede, 2001) and are therefore expected not to have a problem with ad hoc donations, that might not be expected. However, there is no basis on which to say that these individuals with a lower level of uncertainty avoidance have a strong preference for either a structural or an ad hoc donation. This leads to the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 2.1: Individuals from cultures with a high uncertainty avoidance will be most likely to choose for a structural donations, as opposed to an ad hoc donation, while individuals from cultures with a low uncertainty avoidance will have no preference.
Height and type of donation are not necessarily independent of each other. Wunderink (2002) finds that structural donations are often higher than incidental ones, as structural gifts are a part of a person’s internal accounting system, meaning that money is set aside for charities, just like it is done for groceries, presents etc. This relationship means that, on average, individuals giving structural gifts would spend more on charity than people donating ad hoc. Hypothesis 2.1 already states that
individuals from a culture with a high level of Uncertainty Avoidance might be more likely to choose for structural donations than individuals from a low Uncertainty Avoidance culture. If it is true that individuals from a culture with a high level of Uncertainty Avoidance prefer structural gifts because this creates more certainty and if it is true that structural gifts are on average higher than ad hoc gifts, it is not hard to see how we can deduct from this that individuals from countries with a high Uncertainty Avoidance might also be likely to donate higher amounts on average. Individuals from cultures with a low Uncertainty Avoidance are expected to have no preference for either type and would therefore probably give more often ad hoc donations than their counterparts with a high Uncertainty Avoidance, which shy away from these. If ad hoc gifts, on average, are lower
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Hypothesis 2.2: Donations from individuals from a culture with a high uncertainty avoidance are on average higher than those of individuals from a culture with a low uncertainty avoidance.
One other cultural dimension that might influence the height of the donation is Trompenaars’ dimension of Achievement vs Ascription (Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner, 1998). This dimension looks at a culture’s perception of status: do you have to prove yourself in life in order to get status or is status given to you at birth. In a culture that values achievement, individuals need to show their skills and accomplishments in life in order to get status, while in a culture that values ascription, your family name determines your status: you are born with a certain status and will die with that same status. One way for people in achievement-valuing countries to prove themselves and to show their wealth and achievement in life, is to donate to charities. In the United States, a country which scores high on the achievement scale, it is common for the wealthy individuals to show their wealth by donating significant amounts of money to a charity, or starting their own charity (Silk and Lintott, 2002), something that well-known wealthy Americans such as Bill Gates, Oprah or Dr Phil did. In achievement-valuing countries, giving significant amounts of money to charity is seen as a way to prove yourself, as a way to get status. Therefore, donations to charities will be higher in these type of cultures, than in cultures with a high level of ascription. In these cultures, status cannot be bought and therefore giving high amounts to charity will not get you anywhere higher on the societal ladder. Therefore, I propose the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 2.3: Individuals from achievement-valuing cultures donate, on average, higher amounts than individuals from ascription-valuing cultures.
The expectation is that the cultural dimensions influencing the height and type of donation are uncertainty avoidance, as presented by Hofstede (1993) and achievement vs ascription, as per Trompenaar and Hampden-Turner (1998).The former will be most likely influencing the type of donation, while the height of the donation might be influenced by the latter and partly by the former.
2.5 Donor decision 3: Decision on type of charity to donate to
Another, rather important, decision that a donor needs to make, is where he/she would like to give money to. This could be seen as per individual charity, but for this research, it is more important to focus on the cause that individuals choose to give to. In other words: which type of charity
individuals decide to donate to. There are multiple factors that weigh in when making this decision. One of the factors that is often named in literature is familiarity with the charity (Wunderink, 2002; Bennett and Ali-Choudhury, 2009). A charity that is well-known, both by name and by their cause, creates the most sympathy with potential donors, leading to donations. Familiarity creates a feeling of safety, giving donors a feeling that their money will be well spend. Another factor influencing the choice of charity, is empathy (Wunderink, 2002). Empathy is most often created by personal circumstances of a (potential) donor. If an individual has lost a relative to cancer, chances are that they are more willing to give to a charity fighting cancer than one fighting lung diseases. Both sympathy and empathy are individually determined. Sympathy through familiarity can be partly created through advertising, although individuals and cultural groups can differ in their
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as women in feminine countries, while men in feminine countries react in a different way, more similar to the reaction of women in masculine countries. (Nelsen et al, 2006) This means that creating international sympathy through familiarity is a difficult task for charities. Creating empathy is even more difficult, if not virtually impossible. Empathy can only be created on an individual basis and is hard to measure on a group-level, as an individual’s personal experiences are what determines whether or not he has empathy for a certain cause. A more measurable and practical social factor that influences the choice for a certain type of charity, is education. According to the WSPA (the World Society for the Protection of Animals), an international animal welfare charity, education is one of the main factors that might cause of prevent animal cruelty5. Individuals need to be taught that animals have certain needs and feelings, in order for them to value animal welfare. People that are not educated in this way, are less likely to see an animal as a living creature with needs that are the same as a human’s and these individuals are therefore less likely to donate to a charity providing these needs.
When shifting focus to a more cultural perspective, the issue arises that no prior research has been done on this subject, so no direct sources are available, leading to hypotheses derived from a combination of other research fields. When looking at the cultural dimensions that might determine the choice for a certain charity, there are some that might hypothetically influence this decision. One of these dimensions might be masculinity vs femininity, as per Hofstede (2001). As said earlier, in feminine cultures, the government has a strong caring role towards its civilians (Nelsen et al, 2006). This means that, if people are in distress, it is the job of their government to aid them and better the situation. Therefore, within these cultures, people are seen as being protected by their government or at least that this should, from this cultural perspective, be the norm (Nelsen et al, 2006). Because of this perceived protection of people by their government, it might be that individuals from
feminine cultures are less likely to donate to a humanitarian charity and more likely to be willing to donate to a charity that helps animals or nature, as there is no protection for these groups. In masculine cultures, the government is not seen within a caring role. These cultures have a higher individual responsibility when it comes to helping fellow members of society, as there is practically no safety net provided by the government. As these cultures do not have this extra layer of protection for humans over animals and nature, it is thought that individuals from masculine countries will not have a strong tendency to choose one type of charity over the other. This leads to the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 3.1: Individuals from feminine cultures are more likely to donate to a animal-welfare or nature-preservation charity than to a humanitarian charity, while individuals from masculine countries have little preference for one of these types.
If focus is shifted to religion, rather than cultural dimensions, it shows that this might have a strong influence on the choice for type of charity, because of their differing views on the various causes of charities. Samad and Glenn (2010) were already mentioned as having researched the charitable giving preached in monotheistic faiths. Most of these scriptures talk about the importance of helping your fellow human being. Animals are rarely named in the Bible, Torah and Koran, and when they are, they are used as a tool: either for transportation or as a sacrifice towards either God or Allah (Samad and Glenn, 2010). Polytheistic faiths, such as Hinduism and Buddhism look at animals and
5
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nature in a different way. Buddhistic scripture talks about three types of charity, that practitioners can execute daily: the giving of material offerings to the poor (Amisa dana); the giving of protection and care to animals (Abhaya dana); and the giving of doctrinal lectures to spread wisdom (Dhamma dana)6. The fact that animals are named as one of the three sacred ways of being charitable, can influence the type of charity that people might choose. In polytheistic faiths, which believe in reincarnation (Rinehart, 2004), humans are on a more equal footing with animals and the natural world. After all, hurting an animal might mean hurting a soul that was a human being in a former life. Monotheistic faiths place humans above animals and the natural world. This difference in religious view, could have an effect on the type of charity that an individual might choose to donate to. When your religion teaches you to value a certain cause more than others, you are more likely to donate to a charity supporting that cause. This leads to the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 3.2: Practitioners of polytheistic faiths are more likely to choose for an animal-welfare or nature-preserving charity than practitioners of monotheistic faiths.
The factors presented in this paper to influence the choice on the type of charity to donate to, are thought to be mainly found in religion and in the cultural dimensions of masculinity vs femininity, as per Hofstede (1993). Both are thought to mainly determine if individuals find it more important to help other human beings or to help animals or nature.
2.6 Conclusion and Conceptual Model
The study of previous research into this topic has led to several hypotheses to be tested in this current research. The expectations are that the factors influencing donating behaviour of individuals are mostly religion and the cultural dimensions of Masculinity, Individualism, Uncertainty avoidance, Achievement vs ascription and internal vs external Locus of control. Each of these factors will be tested for their influence on one or more of the three donating decisions, leading to a description of what cultural factors might influence the donating behaviour of individuals and how. To graphically depict the full extent of the research and the hypotheses, a conceptual model will be presented here. This conceptual model shows which cultural factors are expected to influence which donor decision and how, which will constitute the donating behaviour of individuals. Note that not all the
relationships have been marked as positive or negative, as some factors do not have a positive or negative relationship, per se, but only pose an influence on the dependent variables (the donating decisions). The only reason that either a positive or negative relationship can be measured here, is because nominal scales have been added to represent different alternatives. For example, the level of femininity will not influence donor decision 3 in a positive or negative way, but just influences which type of charity people are most likely to choose. There are three hypotheses that can not be classified as either negative or positive, which are marked as n/a, the rest of the hypotheses can be quantified in this way and is marked either +, - or +/- (if the effect is unknown).
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Figure 1: Conceptual Model: which cultural factors influence donor decisions?
Source: own design
3.
Methodology
To test the hypotheses stated in chapter 3, an empirical research will be done. What this research will entail and how to measure the variables necessary to test each hypothesis will be highlighted in this chapter. The chapter will start with a broad description of the research and will move on to the specific variables to be tested, including a determination of the different score on the cultural dimensions. The chapter will conclude with a description of the statistical tests that will be done to verify or reject the hypotheses.
3.1 Data Collection
The empirical research to test the proposed hypotheses will start with the gathering of data by means of an online questionnaire (see Appendix 1). This questionnaire consists of closed and open questions. The closed questions range from yes/no questions to putting in order of liking to 7-point Likert scales, ranging from completely agree to completely disagree. The questions are designed to fit within a quantitative research, so that statistical tests can be done on them. However, open
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nationality is not a very subtle and nuanced way of doing this. However, as Hofstede (1993) and Tromepnaars’ (1998) only consider national cultures, sub-cultures were excluded from this research to ensure coherence with their dimensions, leading to a classification on a national level only. The composed questionnaire was spread under students of the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, both national students and international students. This sample was chosen due to its easy accessibility and international variety.
The online questionnaire was spread via e-mail in order to increase the number of potential respondents. Respondents could fill in the questionnaire online, which was done to increase the convenience for respondents and therefore heighten the response rate.
The total number of returned questionnaires was 92, of which 60 were filled in by Dutch respondents and 32 by foreign respondents. The data was skimmed to remove those respondents that failed to answer enough questions. For this research, a respondent has answered ´enough´ questions in order for the data to be usable, if all the questions on at least one donor decision have been answered. This means that the results can be used to test some hypotheses, while for other hypotheses, the
responses of these individuals will be disregarded. After this skimming, the total number of responses equaled 87, of which 58 were Dutch respondents and the other 29 foreign.
3.2 Variables
The most important variables gathered through this questionnaire are nationality, religion, willingness to donate on a 7 point Likert scale, actual act of donating on a 7 point Likert scale, preferred type of donation, percentage of income to donate and preferred type of charity. Here, the independent variables are considered nationality and religion, which influence the dependent variables, which are the other 5 variables. A combination of these variables will be able to test all the hypotheses.
3.3 Scores translated
3.3.1 Cultural Dimension score
As said before, the scores of the sample on each of the tested cultural dimensions of both Hofstede and Trompenaars is an essential part of this research. The scores reflect the points, out of a 100, that a national culture scores on this particular dimension. For example, a score of 30 on masculinity means that the culture has a high feminine character, while a score of 75 will indicate a high level of masculinity. Both Hofstede and Trompenaars have scored a high amount of national cultures on the dimensions in their model. The scores of Hofstede for each of the countries was taken from
Hofstede’s own website7 and those used in this research be displayed in Table 1.
The score on Trompenaars’ dimensions were harder to determine. This is mostly because
Trompenaars has not specifically classified country scores, but only published the results on different questions used in a questionnaire among different nationalities. This means that, from the published results on each of the questions, an average score on each cultural dimension needed to be
calculated. Trompenaars´ has questioned 55 nationalities on cultural dimensions in his book ´Riding
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the Waves of Culture´ (Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner, 1998). For the two dimensions used in this research, the published results were averaged and displayed in Table 4.
Some of the countries in the sample used for this research, could not be found for both Hofstede’s dimensions and/or Trompenaars’ dimensions. This was solved in one of three ways:, first, by looking at other sources that copied the research from Hofstede or Trompenaars and applied it in the missing countries. If these were not available, averages given by Hofstede for the region of the named country were used. However, this could only be done if the average was given over a small area, such as the Arab World or the Scandinavian countries. Taking the average of Europe to get the scores of, for example, Romania, will not be representative. Trompenaars, unfortunately, does not give averages, therefore this method could not be used for his dimensions. If this second option was not available either, the respondent from this country was disregarded from the hypotheses in which the score is used. The first method, that of looking at other research, was used to get the score on Hofstede’s dimensions for Romania (Neculăesei and Tătărusanu, 2008) and Bulgaria (Davidkov, 2004). For two countries, Kyrgyz and Estonian, no information was found on both Hofstede’s and Trompenaars’ dimensions, leading to an exclusion from certain hypotheses. The resulting scores are presented in Table 4. Dimension Country Masculinity (Hofstede) Individualism (Hofstede) Uncertainty Avoidance (Hofstede) Locus of Control (Trompenaars) Achievement vs Ascription (Trompenaars) Netherlands 14 80 53 75 70 Romania 45a 32a 69a 70 73 Bulgaria 50a 49a 68a 56 78 Germany 61 63 60 66 58 Belgium 48 70 94 72 72 Colombia 59 8 75 33 69 New Zealand 54 75 46 80 89 China 51 11 36 39 81 Canada 48 76 44 79 87 Mexico 64 25 78 - 81 Greece 51 30 95 67 79 Portugal 26 21 94 62 86 Finland 21 58 53 68 89 The Philippines 60 28 40 26 62 Hungary 88 80 82 63 83 Vietnam 40 19 31 - - Estonia - - - - - Kyrgyz - - - - -
Table 4: Overview of cultural dimension scores Hofstede and Trompenaars
Sources: www.geert-hofstede.com; Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner (1998); Davidkov, 2004; Neculăesei and Tătărusanu, 2008
a = based on research by other authors b = based on regional average
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3.3.2 Variables on Willingness to donate
To measure an individual’s willingness to donate and the chance that he/she will donate, 4 statements were used, named here once again for clarity:
A: I feel that donating to charities is important
B: I feel that I would most likely spend my money on other things than charity C: In my current financial situation, I am likely to donate to a charity
D: If my financial situation was different, I would be likely to donate to a charity
Each of the statements needed to be scored on a 7-point Likert scale, ranging from ‘I completely disagree’ to ‘I completely agree’. Of these statements, 3 were designed to measure the positive to donating (I would donate) and 1 was designed to measure the negative attitude towards donating (I wouldn’t donate). Furthermore, statement C and D are meant to be moderators of each other, to control for the fact that students are most often not in the financial position to donate to charities. This means that the scores cannot just be added to translate the responses into a variable. However, if the scores of statement B are recoded in the opposite order (1 becoming 7 and 7 becoming 1), the scores can be added, forming a score on the willingness to donate. The higher this score, the higher the willingness to donate.
3.3.3 Variables on Height and Type of donation
The second donor decision consists of two elements: the type of donation and the height of donation. The type of donation is taken directly from the questionnaire, but in code, with 1 being structural donation, 2 being ad hoc donation and 3 being no preference.
The height of donation is determined in ordinal categories, ranging from 1 (representing the
donating of 0% of income to charity) to 7 (representing the donating of more than 10% of income to charity).
For both of these variables, a 0 was added when a respondent did not answer one of the questions.
3.3.4 Variables on Type of charity
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3.4 Statistical testing
To determine the relations between the different variables mentioned above, a Pearson Correlation8 will be executed. This test will determine the strength of a relation between two factors, indicated by a number between -1 and 1. These numbers need to be interpreted, first by looking at their sign (either a – or a +), indicating a positive or negative relationship between the two factors. Secondly, the number itself indicates the strength of the relationship: a 1 means that the two factors are completely linearly related, while a 0 means no relation at all. Each of the hypotheses can be tested in this way. To conclude the report, a regression analysis will be done, to see which factor has the largest impact on each of the three donor decisions.
3.5 Conclusion on Methodology
The methodology used to test this research consists of questionnaires to determine an individual’s response to the three donor decisions, which are shown as dependent variables. Furthermore, their nationality and religion are asked for, which will function as the independent variables. The data will be analyzed with the help of SPSS, by way of a Pearson Correlation. This will show how strong the relationship between several dependent and independent variables is. As a conclusion, a Regression analysis will be executed, to determine the impact that each independent variable has on the dependent variable.
4.
Results of the research
This chapter will show the results of the research described above. The results will be shown per donor decision, with each donor decision split up into multiple hypotheses. Each hypothesis will be given, including the results on that hypothesis based on the executed research. The results of the correlation tests done on each hypothesis can be found in the recap table (Table 8) in chapter 5.5. Any deviations from the expected outcome will be reflected on in chapter 6 ´Discussion´.
Furthermore, when analyzing the data, some unexpected, yet significant, relationships between the variables became apparent. These results, which were not framed as hypotheses, will be given throughout this chapter, each connected to the specific donor decisions that they influence. Each paragraph will end with a regression analysis, done on all the variables connected to that specific donor decision, both those framed as hypotheses and those that were unexpectedly related.
8
Given the fact that some variables can be classified as ordinal or nominal, a Pearson correlation might be seen as
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4.1 Results on donor decision 1: the decision whether or not to donate
Donor decision 1 was segmented into 4 different hypotheses, each regarding a different variable that might influence the willingness to donate. Each of the hypotheses will be discussed separately below.
4.1.1 Hypothesis 1.1: results
The first hypothesis regarding donor decision 1, concerned the influence that the masculinity of a culture has on the willingness to donate. Because in feminine cultures, the government takes care of its civilians and is expected to solve the problems in the world, it was expected that individuals feel less that the responsibility of helping charities is with them, but more with their government. Masculine countries are more focused on the responsibility of the individual and are therefore expected to be more willing to step up and take this responsibility to help charities. This was shown in hypothesis 1.1:
Individuals from masculine cultures will more often decide to donate to charity than individuals from feminine cultures.
However, despite the expectations and the past research that this was based on, the statistical tests do not show any significance as to the relationship between ‘Masculinity’ and ‘Willingness to donate’ (r =.102, p>.10).
4.1.2 Hypothesis 1.2: results
The second hypothesis regarding donor decision one stated that the level of individualism in a country will influence the willingness to donate. However, the direction was not clear. Therefore, the expectation is that there is a significant relationship, but the sign of this relationship is unclear, as stated in hypothesis 1.2:
The level of collectivism vs individualism of a country will influence the donating behavior, but the direction in which it influences it can differ.
As was expected, the relationship between ‘Individualism’ and ‘Willingness to donate’ is significant (r=-.33, p<.005). The test shows that there is a strong negative relationship between the two variables, as high as -,330. This means that the higher the level of individualism, the lower the willingness to donate and, in reverse, the higher the level of collectivism, the higher the willingness to donate.
4.1.3 Hypothesis 1.3: results
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Individuals from cultures with an internal locus of control are more likely to donate to a charity than
individuals from a culture with an external locus of control.
However, the results generated by this research, indicate a different story. The relationship between the two variables is significant (r=-.22, p<.05). However, this correlation indicates that the
relationship between internal locus of control and willingness to donate is negative. This means that the hypothesis is reversed and that, according to these results, an individual with an internal locus of control is less willing to donate than an individual with an external locus of control.
4.1.4 Hypothesis 1.4: results
The last hypothesis regarding the decision on whether or not to donate, was related to religion. It stated:
Practitioners of a belief that dictates rules for charitable giving, such as the Islam, will sooner donate than practitioners of faiths that don’t dictate this, such as Christianity or a polytheistic faith.
This result was expected, as some religions are more pressing their followers into donating than others, which is expected to have an effect on the decision to donate. The outcome, however, is different. First of all, it shows that there is no significant relationship between the variables ‘Religion’ and the ‘Willingness to give’ (r=-.02, p>.10). Furthermore, the results did not generate a high enough diversification of religions to test the hypothesis further. For the Jewish, Islamic and Buddhist faiths, only 1 respondent indicated that he/she was a follower of these respective faiths, coming down to only 1,1% of respondents. There were no respondents indicating that they were a Hindu. The most prominent groups were the Christians, with 54% of respondents and the atheists, with 40,2% of respondents indicating they did not believe in a deity. Due to this result, hypothesis 1.1 can not effectively be tested.
4.1.5 Regression analysis Donor decision 1
To test the impact that the independent variables have on donor decision 1, the Willingness to donate, a regression analysis is executed, using the independent variables Religion, Masculinity, Individualism and Locus of Control. When doing the regression analysis, the output shows that none of these coefficients is significant, even at a .10 level.
~ 26 ~ Dependent Variable Independent Variables Willingness to donate Masculinity -.20 Individualism -.14 Locus of Control -.26 Religion -.11 Adjusted R² .04
Table 5: Regression Analysis donor decision 1 * significant at the ,05 level (2-tailed) ** significant at the ,01 level (2-tailed) *** significant at the ,001 level (2-tailed)
4.2 Results on donor decision 2: decision on height and type of donation
The second donor decision, the decision on how much to donate and in what way to donate, was spilt up into three hypotheses, of which two were linked by the assumption that height and type of donation are linked, as was found by Wunderink (2002). In this research, too, it shows that the type and height of donation are linked (r=-.29, p<.01). This shows that the relationship is negative , which means in this research that people that prefer a structural gift, tend to donate more than individuals choosing for an ad hoc gift or have no preference. Now that the assumption that the two variables (‘Height’ and ‘Type’ of donation) are related has also been confirmed in this research, the results on the hypotheses connected to these two variables will be given.
4.2.1 Hypothesis 2.1: results
The first hypothesis testing donor decision 2 concerned the relationship between ‘Uncertainty Avoidance’ and ‘Type of donation’. It was expected that individuals from a culture with a high
uncertainty avoidance will prefer structural donations, as these give more certainty than ad hoc gifts, as was expressed in hypothesis 2.1:
Individuals from cultures with a high uncertainty avoidance will be most likely to choose for a structural donations, as opposed to an ad hoc donation, while individuals from cultures with a low uncertainty avoidance will have no preference.
However, this assumption was not proven by the data gathered for this research. The relationship is insignificant (r=.02, p>.10).
The possible reasons for the deviation will be explained in the Discussion.
4.2.2 Hypothesis 2.2: results
The second hypothesis on donor decision 2 is connected to the first: as it is assumed that structural gifts are higher than ad hoc gifts and as it was assumed that individuals from a culture with high uncertainty avoidance would prefer structural gifts, hypothesis 2.2 was derived from that as follows:
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However, now that the relationship between the variables ‘Uncertainty Avoidance’ and ‘Type of donation’ could not be established as significant, it comes as no surprise that this derivative hypothesis is also insignificant (r= .01, p>.50).
4.2.3 Hypothesis 2.3: results
The third hypothesis concerning the decision on height and type of donation, looks at the
relationship between the dimension of achievement vs ascription and the height of the donation. The reasoning is that, in achievement-valuing cultures, giving high amounts of money to charity might boost your status, leading to hypothesis 2.3:
Individuals from achievement-valuing cultures on average donate higher amounts than individuals from ascription-valuing cultures.
When looking at the results from the correlation, a marginal significance is shown (r=.20, p<.10). This means that the relationship is not very strong, but is marginally significant. The relationship is positive, meaning that the higher the focus on achievement as a measure for status within a culture, the higher the preferred amounts to be donated are. This confirm the hypotheses, albeit hesitantly.
4.2.4 Unexpected result: Masculinity – Type of donation
Besides the results for the hypotheses, one other significant relationship came out of the correlation, concerning donor decision 2. The Pearson Correlation showed a highly significant positive
relationship between type of donation and masculinity of a culture (r=.29; p<.01). This means that the less masculine a culture is, the more individuals from this culture prefer a structural gift over an ad hoc gift. A higher level of masculinity results in either a higher preference for an ad hoc gift or no preference at all.
4.2.5 Regression analysis Donor decision 2
The second donor decision was a combination of two elements: height of donation and type of donation. To further analyze the impact that the independent variables have on this donor decision, these two elements will be tested separately, starting with the type of donation. An overview of the results can be found in tables 6.1 and 6.2.
