What Gives? Review

Reed Monges

09/25/17

What gives? Cross-national differences in students’ giving behavior?:

By: Chulhee Kang, Femida Handy, Lesley Hustinx, Ram Cnaan Jeffrey L. Brudney, Debbie Haski-Leventhal, Kirsten Holmes, Lucas Meijs, Anne Birgitta Pessi, Bhagyashree Ranade, Karen Smith, Naoto Yamauchi, Siniša Zrinščak

Key Words:

• Giving, Volunteering, Donating, Giving Behaviors, University Students, 5 Civil Society Models

Literature Review:

• Hard to access volunteering/giving records for some countries (or unreliable) (Cnaan, 2010)
• Tend to give what you have more of (Money vs. time)
• Public goods model: givers are pure altruists, give to maximize effect (Handy, 2008)

• Giving provides no utility, gift can be money or time but not both (substitutes)
• Volunteer OR donate but do not do both (inefficient)

• Consumption Model: Explains simultaneous volunteering/donating

- People are impure altruists, giving motivated by private benefits (“Warm Glow” feeling [Different for giving of money vs. time]), warm glow= utility for giver

- People want “Warm Glows” from volunteering and donating so do both

- Private benefits: Career enhancement, public image boost, more positive characteristics

•  University Students: civic involvement can deepen when exposed to numerous opportunities, tend to promote volunteerism
• 5 models of civil society: Liberal, Corporatist, Social Democratic, Statist, and Traditional
• Individual characteristics (differences) can affect student giving
• Contextual variables explain scope of non-profit sector and influence giving behavior
• Liberal model: greater reliance on private giving and nonprofit

• Volunteering and donating most likely to occur due to ample opportunities

• Corporatist Model: comparable to social-political organization, interest groups cooperate with the state to achieve common societal goals

• Heavier reliance on paid staff than volunteers, large non-profit sector, moderate number of volunteer opportunities, government funding crowds out donations

• Social Democratic Model: state involvement is dominant as funder and provider of services leading to nonprofit sector predominant in expressive services and self-supporting organizations

-Crowds out donations, high volunteer rates in areas of activity (sports, advocacy, etc.)

-Scandinavian countries outsource welfare increasing volunteering/donations

• Three models above are common, characteristics of developed societies (Liberal and Social-Democratic share medium government support and heavy volunteer reliance)
• Different features (government support and private giving) impact student giving due to different contexts, opportunities, and expectations
• Societies where industrialization occurred later or is in incipient stages with democratic governance sacrificed to accelerate economic development/maintain social order led to two emerging models: Statist and Traditional
• Statist Model: State actively opposed to certain civil societal activity

• Small non-profit sector, little government support and volunteering
• Civil society organizations depend on income from fees/philanthropy
• Unobservable balance between service and expressive activity
• Few volunteer opportunities, low expectations, limited engagement

• Traditional Model: pre-modern forms of social interaction and helping dominate

• Small non-profit sector, limited government support
• Sizeable volunteer participation due to limited political restrictions
• Primary function of non-profits is poverty relief/development assistance (^ donations)

• Statist and Traditional models have small non-profit sectors with low government involvement leading to lower engagement in giving behaviors

• Differ due to political restrictions and income differences from fees and philanthropy

Problem Author Addressing:

• Understand the giving behavior of students across 13 countries

-Australia (Liberal), Belgium (Corporatist), Canada (Liberal), China (Statist/Traditional), England (Liberal), Finland (Social Democratic), India (Traditional), Israel (Corporatist), Japan (Statist), South Korea (Statist), Netherlands (Corporatist), New Zealand (Liberal), and United States of America (Liberal)

- 600 non-randomly distributed surveys per country with 9,442 respondents  

• Individual and Cross-National characteristics and values that effect giving

• Money, Success, Happiness, Comfort, Freedom, Help Impoverished, Improving World, Faith

• How the 5 societal models effect giving (countries segmented into models)
• Distribution of giving behavior among university students cross-nationally with respect to 4 types
• Any differences in giving behavior of university students according to 5 civil society models
• Individual variables effecting variation in giving behavior of university students

Research Findings:

• Age, Gender, Personal Income, Religion, Immigrant Status, Marital Status, Household Income, School Values, School Requirements, and Area of Study
• 49.6% only donated, 28% do neither, 17% do both, 5.4%, individual countries numbers similar except Japan (students least likely in either giving behavior)
• Corporatist, Social-Democratic, and Liberal models show similar giving behavior
• Statist and Traditional models show similar giving behavior
• Liberal and Corporatist: Service Dominant, Traditional and Social-Democratic: Expressive Dominant, Statist: Depends on Country
• All explanatory variables attain statistical significance in predicting different giving behaviors
• Comparisons: Both vs. Neither: Students who do both tended to be older religious females, from high-income families attending volunteer requiring schools that place high value on non-materialistics while those that did neither were from traditional or statist countries majoring in business and place high value on material items. There were no differences in European Corporatist Countries or Social-Democratic Finland

Both vs. Donating: Students who only donated where exactly comparable to those who did neither but it also includes Social-Democratic Finland, those who did both were similar to the last comparison including European Corporatist countries, there were no differences when it came to age, gender, and volunteering in school

Both vs Volunteering: Students who only volunteer tended to be from European Corporatists countries or countries who follow the traditional model, those who did both had basically the same characteristics from the last two comparisons, the only big change for the last comparison was the factors that made no difference; age, gender, major, and school volunteer requirements