The China NonProfit Review Vol.13 No.1&2_CNPR article 4

The Influences of Individuals’ Space Angles

on Charitable Donations

WANG Wangshuai & LI Jie*

[abstract] The big gap between the rich and the poor has become a major challenge for China’s rapid development. Donation is an effective form of social redistribution. However, donation behavior, especially charitable donation by individuals, is still in its infancy stage in China. How to motivate individuals to donate? Based on the embodied cognition theory, this paper proposes an effective and convenient method: changing people’s perspective and letting people look down from top, then they will have higher donation willingness. In three experimental studies, this effect was validated using different manipulations, samples, and measurements. The study extends our understanding on charitable giving and prosocial behavior. In addition, the results have important implications for governmental sectors and public welfare organizations to motivate individual donation behavior.

[Keywords] Charitable donations; Prosocial behavior; Sensory; Embodied cognition

*This paper is the result of the National Natural Science Foundation of China project "The Formation Mechanism of Social Entrepreneurial Legitimacy and Its Influence on Social Entrepreneurial Performance: A Linguistic Expectation Theory Perspective" (Grant No. 71702095), and the staged result of the Shanghai Chenguang Program project "The Negative Impact of Losing Face, or Diao-mian-zi, on Consumer Self-Control and Intervention Measures" (Grant No. 19CG64).

*Wang Wangshuai, Assistant Professor, School of Business, Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University; Li Jie, Associate Professor, School of Business, Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University.

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