Charity Debate on Stanford.edu

This journal segment is donated to a reading about an article titled, “Should Charities Ask For Time Before Money” found on Stanford Business School’s Graduate website. The main thesis of this article finds that a charity is likely to get more money from donators by asking them for their time and effort before asking for monetary donations. They find this to be true mainly because the more time and effort a person puts into a cause the more emotional their personal connection will be with the organization and specific people in need of help. The coauthors of this study find that donating time vs money creates two different mindsets in the donator. When donating time people ask themselves if what they are doing will make them happy or emotionally attached. When donating money people tend to contemplate issues regarding whether or not it will put a dent in their wallet and think more from an economical standpoint. The coauthors conducted three studies for the article. The first study asks participants to read an article about a fictional charitable organization. The experiment found that the article asking for time before money consequently found that people were willing to offer twice as much money than if the article were to be presented the other way around. The second experiment involved a fake article that asked for time, but not money at all. The experimenters provided a donation box seen near the exit door. People still gave twice as much to the organization that did not ask for any money at all over the organization that explicitly asked for cash. This shows that the mere sign of a financial donation makes people distant to the cause. The article’s concluding experiment basically found that the reasons why people were so willing to donate their time rather than money does not have any correlation with guilt. Donating money before time finds that people donate more due to guilt. By donating time rather than money, it is possible to have the opportunity to become more engaged in the actual cause. By just donating money the exact opposite exists, as the donator is more inclined to become much more disengaged. Human beings wish to be a part of something greater than themselves. By donating the gifts that God has given each of us, it is possible to create in such a positive and real way for not only our fellow man, but for our community and world too.