Scale to Measure Attitudes Influencing Monetary Donations to Charitable Organisations

What it measures

A multi-dimensional instrument validated to capture the attitudinal antecedents of monetary charitable giving. Developed via exploratory item generation, expert review, and CFA validation (n=398). The four-factor structure demonstrated acceptable fit with convergent and discriminant validity confirmed via average variance extracted and inter-construct correlations. ATH captures moral and prosocial orientation underlying charitable intent; AN reflects appraisal of social need severity; SOL is negatively valenced — higher scores indicate discomfort with direct donation requests, functioning as a psychological barrier to actual giving even for prosocially motivated individuals; ACO reflects institutional trust in charities as effective intermediaries. ATH and AN are positive predictors of donation frequency and amount; ACO moderates the translation of prosocial attitudes into actual donations; SOL is a critical construct for direct-mail, door-to-door, and telemarketing fundraising contexts where solicitation pressure may deter otherwise willing donors. The scale enables targeted segmentation: high-AN/low-ACO donors may respond to organisational transparency messaging; high-ATH/high-SOL donors may respond better to low-pressure opt-in channels.

Response format

5-point Likert (1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree); 5 items per subscale; subscale means computed separately; no single composite score recommended

Scale items

Attitude toward Helping — ATH (5 items): general moral orientation and prosocial disposition toward helping those in need. 5-point Likert (1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree). Items averaged.

• I feel a moral obligation to help those less fortunate than myself.
• People should be willing to help others who are less fortunate.
• It is my duty as a citizen to help people who are in need.
• It is important to help others who need assistance.
• Contributing to charities is a good way to extend help to those in need.

Awareness of Need — AN (5 items): perceived scope and severity of unmet social need in society. 5-point Likert. Items averaged.

• There is a great deal of need in this world.
• Many people need help that they are unable to provide for themselves.
• The needs of others in our society are not being adequately met.
• There are many people who are suffering from a lack of basic necessities.
• There is a lot of human suffering in the world today.

Solicitation — SOL (5 items): affective reactions to being directly approached or pressured for charitable donations. 5-point Likert. Higher scores = greater discomfort/negative reaction to solicitation.

• It bothers me when I am directly asked to give to charity.
• I feel uncomfortable when approached by charity solicitors.
• I dislike being pressured to make charitable donations.
• When charity workers contact me directly, I feel imposed upon.
• I resent being solicited for charitable donations.

Attitude toward Charitable Organisations — ACO (5 items): trust, confidence, and positive evaluation of charitable organisations as effective stewards of donated funds. 5-point Likert. Items averaged.

• Most charitable organisations do a good job with the money they receive.
• I believe that charitable organisations are effective at helping those in need.
• Charitable organisations can be trusted to use donation funds wisely.
• Charities are generally honest about how they use proceeds from donations.
• I have confidence in charitable organisations as effective helpers.

Full scale items shown. Always cite the original source when using this scale in research.

Usage notes & scoring

SOL items are negatively worded; report SOL means in their natural negative direction (rather than reverse-scoring) to preserve interpretability for barrier analysis. ATH correlates with general altruism and empathy measures — discriminant validity from Batson's Empathic Concern scale is recommended when both constructs appear in the same study. ACO is contextually sensitive to media coverage of charitable scandals; note data collection timing relative to salient events. Validated with US adult consumers; cross-cultural generalisability is not established. For donation behaviour prediction, supplement with Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behaviour intention and perceived behavioural control items. In cause-related marketing contexts, pair with attitudes toward cause-related marketing (Ross, Patterson & Stutts, 1992) and CRS association measures.

Recommended companion scales

Citation

Webb, D.J., Green, C.L., & Brashear, T.G. (2000). Development and validation of scales to measure attitudes influencing monetary donations to charitable organizations. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 28(2), 299–309.

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