The impact of congruency between moral appeal and social perception on charitable donation

Abstract

Previous research has long paid attention to how to improve persuasive effectiveness in charitable donation. Based on moral foundation theory (MFT) and stereotype content model (SCM), this paper proposes that a match between moral appeal and social perception leads higher persuasive effectiveness of individual donation. More specifically, relative to those who are exposed to a binding appeal, consumers who are exposed to an individualizing appeal are more willing to donate for warmth-oriented organizations. However, for competence-oriented organizations, a binding appeal will garner higher persuasive effectiveness than an individualizing appeal. Furthermore, two types of efficacy (i.e., self-efficacy and response efficacy) mediate the interaction effect of moral appeal and social perception on donation effectiveness. Three lab experiments were conducted to examine these hypotheses. In particular, experiment 1 employed a 3 (moral appeal: binding appeal vs. individualizing appeal vs. neutral) × 2 (social perception: warmth-oriented vs. competence-oriented) two-way between-subjects design. We found that competence-oriented (vs. warmth-oriented) organizations will obtain better donation persuasion results when consumers are exposed to binding (vs. individualizing) appeal, supporting the hypotheses H1a and H1b. Then, in experiment 2, we identified the underlying mechanism, such that the interaction effect is driven by consumers’ response efficacy and self-efficacy, verifying the hypotheses H2a and H2b. Experiment 3 further examined the mediating role of different types of efficacy using a moderation approach. Participants were randomly assigned to one of condition of 3 (moral appeal: binding appeal vs. individualizing appeal vs. neutral) × 2 (social perception: warmth-oriented vs. competence-oriented) × 2 (efficacy: self-efficacy vs. response efficacy). Experiment 3 replicated the findings of previous experiments, showing the robustness of our conclusions. We also ruled out some alternative explanations (e.g., empathy) in the study. Theoretically, this research observes for the first time the interactive effect of moral appeal and social perception, thus extending both moral foundation theory and stereotype content model. The current study also enriches existing donation literature by examining the mediating role of response efficacy and self-efficacy. Managerially, this research has rich implications to charitable organization and companies when they aim to improve persuasive effectiveness in an individual donation.