Is a powerful person more or less generous than a powerless person in terms of charitable giving request? In this work, we argue that power's effect on charitable giving depends on donation target. Across two studies, having high power decreased donation to a specific person, whereas having high power increased donation to a charitable organization. Moreover, the effect of power on donation across donation targets was mediated by the felt social distance toward the population in need. We discuss the theoretical implications for contemporary debates about power's effects and practical implications of power for designing effective donation appeals.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.