Subliminal Influence on Generosity

Ola Andersson, Topi Miettinen, Kaisa Hytönen, Magnus Johannesson and Ute Stephan
Additional contact information
Kaisa Hytönen: Aalto University
Ute Stephan: Aston Business School

No 1084, Working Paper Series from Research Institute of Industrial Economics

Abstract: We experimentally prime subjects subliminally prior to charity donation decisions by showing words that have connotations to prosocial values for a very short duration of time (17ms). Our main finding is that, compared to a baseline condition, the prosocial prime increases donations with about 10–17 percent among subjects with strong prosocial preferences. A similar effect is also found in our data when interacting the prime with the personality characteristic of BigFive agreeableness. We also contribute with providing an arguably better method for testing for "sublimity". The method reveals that some subjects are capable of recognizing some of the prime words, and the results are overall weaker when we control for this capacity.

Keywords: Charity; Subliminal; Priming; Universalism; Values; Personality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C91 D01 D03 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 46 pages
Date: 2015-09-18
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe and nep-exp
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
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https://www.ifn.se/wfiles/wp/wp1084.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Subliminal influence on generosity (2017)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1084

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