The Pentera Blog
Identifying Your Donor's Empathy Type Can Help with Gift Conversations
There are two different kinds of empathy, and identifying the type that is more prevalent in a particular donor can help when it comes to your gift conversations. That's the conclusion of new research presented at a session moderated by Pentera President & CEO Claudine A. Donikian at last year's annual symposium on philanthropy at Indiana University's Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.
Sara Konrath, a psychologist who is a professor at the school and also the principal investigator for iPEAR (the Interdisciplinary Program on Empathy and Altruism Research), discussed her research on empathy and other philanthropic topics. The panel also included well-known planned giving researcher Russell James of Texas Tech University.
Altruists can be rational or emotional
Konrath explained that one type of empathy is cognitive while the other is more emotional. She terms the two types of donors "rational altruists" and "emotional altruists."
"The rational altruist might say, 'I donate to this shelter because I think about the mothers there and what it must be like for them,' " Konrath explained. "The emotional altruist might say, 'I see this happening and can't believe someone would have to go through this, and I feel so much compassion for what is happening and want to help.' "
The rational altruist will tend to use the word "think" when describing philanthropic motives, while the emotional altruist will tend to use the word "feel."
Empathy type affects giving patterns
Konrath has found that the two types of altruists give differently. While her research focuses on outright gifts, the differences are likely to apply to planned gift donors as well.
"We have found that the rational altruists tend to spread out their giving over multiple causes; they give a little bit less but to more causes, almost as if they are trying to spread out the risk to do as much as they possibly can," she said. "Whereas people who score high on emotional empathy - the emotional altruists - tend to donate more money to fewer causes. It's like they are forming deeper emotional bonds with fewer organizations that they then stay committed to."
The study did not try to determine which type of empathy is more popular, partly because there is overlap. "Some people are both," Konrath said. She has also found that both types of empathy have been declining in current generations of young adults in the U.S.
Other research by Konrath and in many other studies has found that empathic people are more likely to volunteer and to give to charity.
"They want to help others; they are givers," Konrath said. "It seems so simple, but even among people who are empathic, the different kinds of empathy really matter for the way that they give."
