The impact of the linear and threshold matching principles on eliciting donation behavior in communal and exchange-oriented individuals

The primary objective of the paper is to investigate the effect of communal and exchange mindsets on donation behavior and how the request for charitable donations using the matching principle can lead both mindsets to donate more. To address this research objective, we conducted three experiments with both student and nationally representative samples, using three different charitable donation contexts. The findings suggest that the donation behavior of exchange-oriented individuals can be significantly increased by utilizing the linear matching principle, while communal-oriented individuals respond well to the threshold matching principle. The results also support our proposed main effect as individuals with a communal-oriented mindset generally donate more than those with an exchange-oriented mindset. These findings contribute to the theory of communal and exchange orientation and matching principle by demonstrating that the communal mindset aligns with the threshold matching, and the exchange mindset aligns with the linear matching principle.