Study shows UW-Green Bay students are charitable

A study titled "Understanding Stakeholders' Responses to Institution-Led Charity Campaigns: A Study of a Haitian Earthquake Relief Campaign" studied students from University of Wisconsin- Green Bay to evaluate the underlying factors that motivate someone to volunteer, as well as the charitable donations students partake in.

Assistant professor Sampath Ranganathan and James Loebl and associate professor Dave Radosevich, members of the Austin E. Cofrin School of Business, were involved in the study.

An electronic survey was distributed to students enrolled in various business courses at UWGB, and a total of 253 undergraduate students participated. Questions were asked to include demographic information of the students, such as age, gender and income. Students were also questioned on the number of hours spent volunteering, amount of money donated annually to charities and their intention to contribute to the Haiti campaign.

 "Our statistics indicate that students at UWGB are charitable," Ranganathan said.

Students reported that on average, they volunteer three hours per month to assist charitable organizations. Respondents said they donated around $144 in the past 12 months to charities. Furthermore, 60 percent of students reported they made monetary donations to charities in the last 12 months and 45 percent donated their time to work for charitable organizations.

"Students also indicated that they were willing to contribute to the Haiti campaign through volunteering, word-of-mouth advertising and donations," Ranganathan said.

Ranganathan, Loebl and Radosevich conducted this study to examine the underlying factors in which a person would be motivated to participate in an institution-led campaign compared to an individual giving their time privately.

According to the Giving USA report for 2010, charitable donations in the United States dropped 3.6 percent between 2008 and 2009. Individual donations are the largest charitable sector for donations in the US. However, these individual charitable donations declined in 2009. The only rising donation through the report was corporate giving.

Many corporations are now becoming involved with organization-led fundraising campaigns, campaigns designated to help a certain cause in which an organization leads volunteers. In spring 2010, UWGB became involved in a Haiti disaster relief campaign. The survey was conducted around the Haiti Relief campaign to analyze the factors of a person volunteering and giving to Haiti during this time led through the organization.

"It was an institution-led campaign and we thought if we could understand why students participate and contribute to this campaign, we could get a good idea about the underlying factors that motivate a person to participate in such campaigns," Ranganathan said.

Through the study, it was concluded that intrinsic factors, a person's religion or values, and extrinsic factors, resume boosting or feeling socially accepted or empowered through the experience, play an intricate role in motivating an individual to participate in campaigns.

"Our findings suggest that an organization-led campaign is likely to be more successful if organization members perceive that the disaster relief campaign is important and that their contribution would make a difference," Ranganathan said. "Perceived importance of the cause would act as an intrinsic motivating factor for members to be committed to the campaign and would have a direct positive impact on members' behavioral intensions.

"Extrinsic factors, such as social value and recognition, were found to have a positive impact on commitment and intentions of volunteering. When organizations approach individuals and tell them every dollar donated will make a difference to someone in the world, individuals may feel more motivated to volunteer and feel they can make a difference, according to the study.

"A successful institutional campaign should recognize members' efforts and contributions," Loebl said.

Ranganathan, Loebl and Radosevich found that there are many different factors that go into a person wanting to volunteer and the factors that motivate them to contribute repeatedly.

"Participating in charitable campaigns and donating money is good citizenship and helps one give back to the world in which he/she lives," Loebl said. "Apart from this benefit, we believe that participating in charitable campaigns makes a student a better leader and teaches them organizing and management skills. This experience would be a good addition to a student's resume, too."

According to the study, the intrinsic and extrinsic factors creates a feeling of accomplishment and a sense of a person's values being fulfilled or a feeling that a person made a difference in the world, and these factors are what keeps people volunteering and participating. The institution-led campaigns were also found very important in this study, and that the institution has the ability to lead the volunteers and recognize them for their efforts.