Giving to Charity

I have always enjoyed giving to charity, I have direct debits set up on my bank account to give to a couple of charities each month and was Charities Captain of my high school, leading a team to raise thousands of pounds. What I had never before considered was why I give my time and money to charitable causes.  It was always something I just did, and my logic was always "I would spend that much on a hot chocolate, I would spend triple that on a t-shirt..." This implies that a little bit of money to me could offer somebody less fortunate a lot more than it was worth to me. I liked being able to help.

While researching the reasons why people gave to charity, I also discovered that I also like being seen as charitable. People perceive charitable people well and I suppose it's an ego thing, all about personality and self concept.

The reasons why I give to charity:

1. It makes me feel good.
2. I like to be perceived as being a charitable and nice person.
3. A genuine desire to help.

The list of reasons why people donate to charity is extensive. Ironically, charitable giving is fundamentally a selfish act.

Like me, some people like to be viewed as kind, this is about self image which doesn't really have much to do with wanting to help a charity.Using the same logic, giving to charity to alleviate guilt, for tax benefits, because of social pressure, to impress the opposite sex, or as a religious obligation don't really suggest a person is naturallly generous and charitable.

In contrast, a large number of people donate to charity out of simple goodwill or, as with many cases, they were personally affected by the charity or its cause.

More than 62% of the UK population donates more than £5 a year to charity. (TGI, 2007) Having established the main reasons why these people donate, I looked into who it was who tended to be the most generous.

As expected, women are more likely to donate to charity than men (TGI, 2007) and they tend to give to causes related to children and animals. They are also more likely to respond to humanitarian reports than men. The Daily Mail (2011) stated that 43% of women would donate to a humanitarian cause like a flood or earthquake after seeing a media appeal compared to 29% of men. However, when men donate they do it less but give larger sums of money. Men give to medical charities related to men's issues and larger, well known organisations that they know they can trust.

Dogs Trust makes videos like these to appeal for donations. By telling a story that tugs at heartstrings and has a happy ending, people will be unable to get involved with the story, namely women. They will then feel the need to help.

Men are harder to target as they don't part with their cash so easily. This advert, created to raise awareness of prostate cancer, uses cartoons (men like humour in advertising) and a simple, factual message. Men would not respond well to a heartwarming story about a man who overcame cancer, but a reminder to get checked is enough for them.

It is single women and couples with no children at home who give the most amount of money to charity.

Source: nfpSyngergy, 2007

What I found most interesting was although higher income households give a larger total sum to charity on average, lower income households were more generous. (Reason.com, 2007) People with less money tend to give a higher proportion of their income to charitable causes.

The three most popular charitable giving causes in the UK are medical, hospital and children and young people related. (Guardian, 2009) This is supported by the survery statistic from 2007 available on TGI.

Source: TGI, 2007

Cancer Research UK was the most popular charity, followed by the NSPCC and Save the Children.

The charity my team and I are fundraising for is Children with Leukaemia. See Website This charity raises money for both children and cancer, putting us in a strong position to attract donations.



Raising money in memory of Matthew Byrne. 1992 - 2009

Please give generously at our Just Giving page.



Charities are suffering because of the recession. Donations fell by 11% in 2009 (Guardian, 2009) and 52% of charities reported being affected by the recession in 2009 which is 38% higher than it was in 2008. (BBC, 2009) Over the last three years, as the economy has worsened the need for services offered by charities has risen. This puts charities in a difficult situation with a high demand for their help but limited funding to actually offer the aid required of them.

• BBC (2009) Charity donation hit by recession. [online] Available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7946518.stm [Accessed 11 January 2011].
• Daily Mail (2011) Women more like to give to disaster charity appeals than men. [online]. Available from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/article-1354832/Women-likely-money-charity-appeals-men.html [Accessed 25 February 2011].
•  Guardian (2009) Recession means people give less to charity. [online] Available from: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/sep/23/charity-donations-down [Accessed 11 January 2011].
• Reason.com (2007) Who gives to charity. [online] Available from: http://reason.com/archives/2007/03/01/who-gives-to-charity [Accessed 20 January 2011].
• TGI (2007) Financial services – charity. KMR Software [Accessed 20 January 2011].