Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(563)
- Faculty Publications (167)
- 2013
- Article
Does Social Connection Turn Good Deeds into Good Feelings? On the Value of Putting the 'Social' in Prosocial Spending
By: Lara B. Aknin, Elizabeth W. Dunn, Gillian M. Sandstrom and Michael I. Norton
When are the emotional benefits of generous behavior most likely to emerge? In three studies, we demonstrate that the hedonic benefits of generous spending are most likely when spending promotes positive social connection. Study 1 shows that people feel happier after... View Details
- April 2013
- Article
Making a Difference Matters: Impact Unlocks the Emotional Benefits of Prosocial Spending
By: Lara B. Aknin, Elizabeth W. Dunn, Ashley V. Whillans, Adam M. Grant and Michael I. Norton
When does giving lead to happiness? Here, we present two studies demonstrating that the
emotional benefits of spending money on others (prosocial spending) are unleashed when
givers are aware of their positive impact. In Study 1, an experiment using real... View Details
- February 7, 2013
- Other Article
Is Doing Good ‘Good Enough’?: Unleashing the Power of Self-Interest in Philanthropy
By: Josh Baron
To take advantage of the unprecedented opportunities for philanthropy to make a difference in society, we have to encourage people to think more consciously and creatively about: "What's in this for me?" View Details
- 2013
- Article
Prosocial Spending and Well-Being: Cross-Cultural Evidence for a Psychological Universal
By: Lara B. Aknin, Christopher P. Barrington-Leigh, Elizabeth W. Dunn, John F. Helliwell, Justine Burns, Robert Biswas-Diener, Imelda Kemeza, Paul Nyende, Claire Ashton-James and Michael I. Norton
This research provides the first support for a possible psychological universal: Human beings around the world derive emotional benefits from using their financial resources to help others (prosocial spending). In Study 1, survey data from 136 countries were examined... View Details
- January 2013 (Revised October 2015)
- Case
Pittsburgh
By: Eric Werker, Meg Rithmire, Benjamin Kennedy and Andrew Knauer
The case narrates the development of Pittsburgh from the 1940s to 2012. It analyzes the collapse of the steel industry in the early 1980s, the city's subsequent decline, and the city's later re-emergence as a hub for higher education, the tech sector, and the... View Details
Keywords: Google; Population; City Growth; Shale; PNC; Tom Murphy; Luke Ravenstahl; Public-private Partnership; Tax Increment Financing; Brownfields; Renaissance; Industry Clusters; Industry Growth; City; Business and Government Relations; Taxation; Philanthropy and Charitable Giving; Nonprofit Organizations; Higher Education; Technology Industry; Health Industry; Steel Industry; Education Industry; Pittsburgh
- November 2012
- Article
An Age Penalty in Racial Preferences
By: Deborah A. Small, Devin G. Pope and Michael I. Norton
We document an age penalty in racial discrimination: charitable behavior toward African American children decreases-and negative stereotypical inferences increase-with the age of those children. Using data from an online charity that solicits donations for school... View Details
- October 2012
- Article
The Gifts We Keep on Giving: Documenting and Destigmatizing the Regifting Taboo
By: Gabrielle S. Adams, Francis J. Flynn and Michael I. Norton
Five studies investigate whether the practice of "regifting"-a social taboo-is as offensive to givers as regifters assume. Participants who imagined regifting thought that the original givers would be more offended than givers reported feeling, to such an extent that... View Details
- August 2012
- Article
Organ Allocation Policy and the Decision to Donate
By: Judd B. Kessler and Alvin E. Roth
Organ donations from deceased donors (cadavers) provide the majority of transplanted organs in the United States, and one deceased donor can save numerous lives by providing multiple organs. Nevertheless, most Americans are not registered organ donors despite the... View Details
- 2012
- Working Paper
The Need for (long) Chains in Kidney Exchange
By: Itai Ashlagi, David Gamarnik, Michael A. Rees and Alvin E. Roth
It has been previously shown that for sufficiently large pools of patient-donor pairs, (almost) efficient kidney exchange can be achieved by using at most 3-way cycles, i.e., by using cycles among no more than 3 patient-donor pairs. However, as kidney exchange has... View Details
- March 2012 (Revised March 2012)
- Teaching Note
Samasource: Give Work, Not Aid (TN)
By: Francesca Gino and Bradely R. Staats
- Article
Happiness Runs in a Circular Motion: Evidence for a Positive Feedback Loop between Prosocial Spending and Happiness
By: Lara B. Aknin, Elizabeth W. Dunn and Michael I. Norton
We examine whether a positive feedback loop exists between spending money on others (i.e. prosocial spending) and happiness. Participants recalled a previous purchase made for either themselves or someone else and then reported their happiness. Afterward, participants... View Details
- 2011
- Book
Getting to Giving: Fundraising the Entrepreneurial Way
By: Howard H. Stevenson and Shirley M. Spence
Getting to Giving is based on Stevenson's many years as a donor, fundraiser and entrepreneur. The book offers practical techniques and real life stories, and brings passion and humor to the art and science of asking for money. Topics included in the book... View Details
- July 2011
- Case
Edna McConnell Clark Foundation-Enabling a Performance Driven Philanthropic Capital Market
By: Allen Grossman and Aldo Sesia
The Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, focused on building the organizational capabilities of nonprofits that served the disadvantaged youth in the United States, has recently been named an intermediary in the federal government's new social innovation fund (SIF), which... View Details
- July 2011
- Article
Kidney Paired Donation
By: C. Bradley Wallis, Kannan P. Samy, Alvin E. Roth and Michael A. Rees
Kidney paired donation (KPD) was first suggested in 1986, but it was not until 2000 when the first paired donation transplant was performed in the U.S. In the past decade, KPD has become the fastest growing source of transplantable kidneys, overcoming the barrier faced... View Details
- June 2011
- Article
Truth in Giving: Experimental Evidence on the Welfare Effects of Informed Giving to the Poor
By: Christina Fong and Felix Oberholzer-Gee
It is often difficult for donors to predict the value of charitable giving because they know little about the persons who receive their help. This concern is particularly acute when making contributions to organizations that serve heterogeneous populations. While we... View Details
- February 2011
- Article
It's the Recipient That Counts: Spending Money on Strong Social Ties Leads to Greater Happiness Than Spending on Weak Social Ties
By: Lara B. Aknin, Gillian M. Sandstrom, Elizabeth W. Dunn and Michael I. Norton
Previous research has shown that spending money on others (prosocial spending) increases happiness. But, do the happiness gains depend on who the money is spent on? Sociologists have distinguished between strong ties with close friends and family and weak... View Details
- 2011
- Working Paper
Memory Lane and Morality: How Childhood Memories Promote Prosocial Behavior
By: Francesca Gino and Sreedhari D. Desai
Four experiments demonstrated that recalling memories from one's own childhood lead people to experience feelings of moral purity and to behave prosocially. In Experiment 1, participants instructed to recall memories from their childhood were more likely to help the... View Details
- January 2011
- Article
Building a Better America—One Wealth Quintile at a Time
By: Michael I. Norton and Dan Ariely
Disagreements about the optimal level of wealth inequality underlie policy debates ranging from taxation to welfare. We attempt to insert the desires of "regular" Americans into these debates, by asking a nationally representative online panel to estimate the current... View Details
- 2010
- Chapter
New Sources in Living Kidney Donation
By: Ruthanne L. Hanto, Alvin E. Roth, M. Utku Ünver and Francis L. Delmonico
- 2010
- Chapter
Feeling Good about Giving: The Benefits (and Costs) of Self-interested Charitable Behavior
By: L. Anik, L. B. Aknin, M. I. Norton and E. W. Dunn
While lay intuitions and pop psychology suggest that helping others leads to higher levels of happiness, the existing evidence only weakly supports this causal claim: research in psychology, economics, and neuroscience exploring the benefits of charitable giving has... View Details