Incentivizing Charitable Giving: A Systematic Review of Self- and Other-Benefiting Incentives for Donating Money

Incentives are sometimes offered to encourage charitable donations. Diverse incentives have been used and studied; however, there has been no overarching analysis of their effectiveness and the conditions under which they work best. To rectify this, we systematically review research on incentives for charitable giving published between 1980 and 2022. We synthesize evidence from 153 unique studies and integrate them into a new framework for conceptualizing incentives as material versus social in nature and self- versus other-benefiting. Some incentives are generally effective (e.g., tax rewards, rebates, match offers, recognition), whereas others have limited effect or may even backfire (e.g., thank you gifts). Turning to the future, we outline a research agenda with four theoretical propositions that warrant further investigation. In doing so, we lay the foundation for new theorizing on the effectiveness of incentives in nonprofit contexts and give practical guidance to fundraisers about which tactics should be most effective.