People tend to judge those who perform good deeds, such as donating money, as moral. Yet, prosocial actors are not equally appraised. In this article, we explore how moral judgment varies based on the donation distribution strategy-that is, the extent to which donors distribute resources across recipients. In seven studies (N = 1,495), we show that distributing help is considered by observers to be more moral than concentrating help on a single recipient. Furthermore, this effect is driven by observers perceiving the donors distributing their help to be more committed toward the charitable cause. We extend the generalizability of our results by showing that the effect replicates across three populations considered culturally distant along the WEIRD dimensions. The article ends with a discussion of the theoretical relevance of the findings.

Consumers are increasingly focusing on enhancing their beauty, a global trend significantly driven by the pervasive influence of social media. The substantial investments of both money and time into personal appearance improvement raises questions about the broader societal effects of such behavior. This study explores whether improvements in individuals' beautifying physical appearance can influence their behavior in areas unrelated to beauty, particularly in regard to prosocial consumer behavior. Across seven studies, including a field experiment, we find that engaging in physical appearance improvement, either actual or digital, increases public self-awareness among consumers. This heightened awareness leads to more frequent prosocial actions, such as charitable donations and ethical purchasing decisions. Furthermore, our research suggests that this inclination towards prosocial behavior becomes more pronounced with improvements in appearance that are noticeable to others. Recognizing physical improvement as a catalyst for prosociality holds significant implications for nonprofit organizations, offering opportunities to craft more effective appeals and optimize advertising strategies to foster prosocial behavior. (c) 2024 Published by Elsevier B.V.

This paper shows the effect of recipients' gender on donors' preferences, depending on donors' culture. Among study participants from both Eastern and Western cultures, the choice of donating to a boy or a girl followed donors' cultural norms. In Western culture (e.g., the United States), donors chose to donate to a girl over a boy, whereas in Eastern culture (e.g., China), the choice was reversed. A choice set of different-gender recipients increased donations (compared to a choice set of the same gender), as gender stereotypes served to justify choosing one recipient over the other. However, when the choice was between an organization and a single child, the child's gender (either boy or girl) did not affect donation behavior. Thus, gender preferences are driven by cultural norms only in cases where the recipient's gender is salient and serves as a culturally justifiable reason for the donor's choice.

Ten studies (N = 4192) demonstrated that individuals depicted as prosocial were judged to be more physically beautiful. This evaluation of prosocial individuals as more beautiful is influenced by a motivation to be associated with prosocial others. This phenomenon was observed in real-world settings (Study 1) and applied to both men and women, both as targets and observers (Studies 2a-2b). The effect persisted in scenarios where participants imagined the target without any visual aid (Study 2c) and extended beyond metaphorical interpretations of beauty (Study 3). The effect weakened when prosocial behaviour was an isolated incident, not indicative of the target's prosocial personality (Study 4). The influence of prosociality on beauty evaluations surpassed that of other positive traits such as intelligence or humour (Study 5) and remained significant despite physical imperfections in the target's appearance (Study 6). The effect diminished in situations where forming a relationship was not feasible, thus supporting the motivated cognition rationale (Studies 7-8). These findings highlight the substantial role of prosocial behaviour in influencing evaluations of physical beauty, a crucial element in social interactions and relationship formation, often outweighing other attributes typically linked to physical appearance evaluation.

The majority of donations are dedicated to helping human recipients. Building on prior literature that demonstrates the role of downward social comparisons between donors and donation recipients in elevating willingness to help those in need, we propose that a maximizing mindset increases such downward social comparisons, which in turn promote donations to human recipients. A set of seven studies, including online and field experiments and a secondary dataset, provides convergent support for the effect of the maximizing mindset (whether measured as an inherent individual difference or activated as a temporary mindset) on donations and the mediating role of downward social comparisons. This research enriches the understanding of donations to human recipients by showing that donations can be enhanced by a maximizing mindset. Our findings offer important insights to donation-raising agencies. Specifically, activating the maximizing mindset among prospective donors—by embedding certain words in donation appeals or encouraging donors to think about their best choices in everyday life—could benefit charities and social-cause platforms in their efforts to raise donations to support the needy.

People tend to evaluate themselves as better than they actually are. Such enhanced positive evaluation occurs not only for the self but also for close others. We extend the exploration of enhanced evaluation of close others to that of strangers. We predict that when individuals consider becoming friends with a stranger, their preference for a pleasant physical experience will drive an enhanced evaluation of that person. In two experiments, participants who considered friendship with a stranger evaluated the stranger as looking, sounding, and smelling better than how control participants evaluated them. The amount of time participants expected to spend with the stranger predicted their evaluation (Studies 1-2). In a large-scale third study, using various target stimuli, we found that when participants have an interest in a friendship but then are unable to physically spend time together, the enhanced-evaluation effect is weaker compared with when they could spend time together.

This research examines gender-based helping behavior from a social dominance perspective. We focused on the interplay between the gender of a prospective donor and the gender of the recipient in shaping donation decisions in contexts that either empower recipients or not. In two studies ( N = 866), male (but not female) donors chose to donate less often (Study 2) and to give lower amounts (Studies 1–2) to women in need than to men when donations were made in a potentially empowering context – a business context (e.g., donating to a person whose shop burned down), than in a nonempowering context – a domestic context (e.g., donating to a person whose house burned down). Lack of empathy for the female recipient among men partially mediated this gender–donation bias effect (Study 2). These findings suggest that men are less likely to help women in situations that empower women and challenge the existing gender hierarchy.

Many donation-raising platforms request that first-time donors choose the charitable causes they most care about so that future campaign recommendations can best match donors' charitable preferences. While matching charitable campaigns to donors' reported preferences has its benefits, little is known about other effects that choosing charitable causes may evoke. We focus on how choosing charitable causes influences charitable behavior. We find two effects of the number of charitable causes donors choose on their subsequent charitable behavior. In studies 1 and 2, we show that a reference number of the maximum charitable causes donors can choose has a negative effect on charitable behavior. A small (versus large) reference number yields a greater likelihood to donate and a higher donation amount. This effect is aligned with the proportion dominance rationalization. In studies 3 and 4, we show that the number of charitable causes donors voluntarily choose as important to them is positively associated with subsequent charitable behavior. This association is mediated by global need perception. As the number of causes donors choose increases, donors experience an escalation in their perception of global neediness, which in turn motivates their willingness to donate and the donation amount. In Study 5, we show how the two effects together shape charitable behavior. These effects are observed while controlling the donors' inherent prosocial attitudes toward help giving. With more than 1.5 million registered non-profit organizations operating in the United States (National Center for Charitable Statistics, 2019), it has become almost impossible for donors to easily choose which charitable campaigns to support. Online charitable fundraising platforms (e.g., One Today by Google, Round Up, and Charity Miles), websites (e.g., AmazonSmile) and crowdfunding platforms (e.g., Fundly, JustGiving, and GoFundMe) try to ease donors' search and decision processes by offering them personalized charitable options. First-time donors are asked to indicate the charitable causes they care most about, and then asked to donate to charitable campaigns that best match their preferences. Interestingly, little is known about how this initial stage of choosing charitable causes influences subsequent donation behavior. In this research, we ask how choosing the charitable causes one cares most about influences subsequent response to a charitable appeal. Obviously, the mere selection of preferred causes enables charities to offer personalized campaigns and create a better fit between non-profits and donors, which has a generally positive effect on charitable giving. However, in this research we focus on an overlooked aspect of these practices. We examine how the number of charitable causes donors indicate as important to them influences their donation giving. We test two opposite effects: the proportion dominance effect, an effect driven by prior research, and the global need perception effect, a new effect identified in this article. Both effects are driven by the number of causes donors choose.

Many charitable organizations offer potential donors the option to choose their donation recipients—suggesting that organizations perceive the availability of such choice as beneficial to donation raising. Building upon research on choice aversion in the context of consumer goods and on the identifiable victim effect in the context of donation giving, we propose that the need to choose one target among multiple needy targets might, in fact, hinder donations. Results of six studies show that when prospective donors are asked to choose between two similar donation targets, they are more likely to opt out of donating altogether than when asked to donate to a single target. We show that the effect of choice on opt‐out rates in donation settings is driven by the conflict between the wish to be helpful and the wish to be fair. We further show that when the conflict is resolved and the choice does not raise fairness concerns, the effect is attenuated and opt‐out rates decline.

Many service providers offer supplementary products related to their ongoing services (e.g., fitness centers offer fitness smartwatches). In seven studies, the authors show that the payment method for such supplementary products (multiple payments vs. a single lump sum) affects customers’ tendency to defect from the provider’s core service over time. Specifically, when customers pay for add-ons in multiple payments—provided that (1) they perceive the add-on as being bundled with the core service and (2) the payment period has an end point—they are initially less likely to defect from the service provider than when they pay in a single payment. Over time, however, as payments are made, this gap closes, such that defection intentions under the two payment methods eventually become similar. The authors propose that this phenomenon reflects “commitment projection,” wherein a decrease in customers’ commitment to the add-on product over time is projected onto their commitment to the service provider. These findings carry important managerial implications, given that many service providers offer add-on products in multiple-payment plans and that customers’ defection decisions substantially affect firms’ profitability.

Self-efficacy constitutes a key factor that influences people's inclination to engage in effortful tasks. In this study, we focus on an interesting interplay between two prominent factors known to influence engagement in effortful tasks: the timing of the task (i.e., whether the task is scheduled to take place in the near or distant future) and individuals' levels of self-control. Across three studies, we show that these two factors have an interacting effect on self-efficacy. Low self-control (LSC) individuals report higher self-efficacy for distant-future effortful tasks than for near-future tasks, whereas high self-control (HSC) individuals report higher self-efficacy for near-future tasks than for distant future tasks. We further demonstrate how self-efficacy then molds individuals' willingness to engage in those effortful tasks. Given that a particular task may comprise effortful aspects alongside more enjoyable aspects, we show that the effects we observe emerge with regard to a task whose effortful aspects are salient and that the effects are eliminated when the enjoyable aspects of that same task are highlighted.

Individuals acknowledge the importance of engaging in virtuous behaviors, but find them difficult. Past research suggests that a distant-future focus may result in more commitment. This researeh demonstrates that, for certain consumers, distant-future execution timing may discourage commitment. Specifically, whereas low self-control consumers are indeed more likely to commit to distant-future behaviors, high self-control consumers are more likely to commit to near-future behaviors. This is demonstrated when commitment does not hold a cost (study 1), but also when it does (study 2). Consumers' time availability certainty underlies the effect: Low self-control consumers feel more certain that in the distant future they will be able to identify the time necessary to fulfill their commitments, whereas high self-control consumers feel more certain regarding their ability to identify their available time in the near future (studies 3a-3b). The effect is shown to occur only when the commitment's time of execution reflects different levels of time concreteness: The effect is eliminated among consumers who perceive the near and distant future as equally concrete or abstract (study 4). (C) 2014 Society for Consumer Psychology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Research suggests that worksite health promotion (WHP) programmes, and specifically health risk assessment (HRA) surveys and health education workshops, can be effective in enhancing employees’ health. However, 50–75% of employees choose not to participate when offered the opportunity to do so. The reasons for nonparticipation and the characteristics of nonparticipants have largely been overlooked. Building on premises of Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, we hypothesize that nonparticipation results from lack or loss of resources, or from the perceived low value of resources. These barriers to participation are expected to be related to employees’ characteristics and beliefs (termed implicit barriers) and reflected in employees’ self-reported reasons for nonparticipation (termed explicit barriers). We surveyed a large random sample of participants and nonparticipants in a WHP programme (n = 1926 employees), which included two steps: a HRA survey and a health education workshop. Participants completed an anonymous web-based questionnaire. Implicit and explicit barriers that reflect resource availability (e.g., age, health status) and valuation (e.g., low value of making a lifestyle change) were identified. The magnitude and nature of these barriers differed between the HRA survey and the workshop. We discuss how future research on WHP programmes can build on these findings and propose practical implications for reducing nonparticipation.

We present the Dispositional Self-Control (DSC) Scale, which reflects individuals' tendency to override 2 types of temptations, termed doing wrong and not doing right. We report a series of 5 studies designed to test the reliability and validity of the scale. As hypothesized, high DSC predicts distant future orientation and low DSC predicts deviant behaviors such as aggression, alcohol misuse, and aberrant driving. DSC also predicts task performance among resource-depleted participants. Taken together, these findings suggest that the DSC Scale could be a useful tool toward further understanding the role of personality in overcoming self-control challenges.