Donor happiness comes from afar: The role of donation beneficiary social distance and benevolence

Abstract

Although donors may prefer contributing to causes that help those who are socially closer to them, we propose that donating to socially distant beneficiaries makes donors feel happier. This occurs because donating to distant (vs. close) others results in an experience of greater benevolence. We further identify regulatory focus as a boundary condition of these effects. In one choice study and four experiments featuring close to 2,500 respondents, we demonstrate this phenomenon across diverse samples and varying forms of beneficiaries. Our research extends prior work examining the impact of recognition from others on charitable behavior to examine donors’ self-evaluations, and how they impact happiness.