Moral appeals to altruism as a means to influence people's prosocial behavior are common, especially in organ donation, but communicators might not consider that conceptions of altruism differ among people, cultures, and scholars. In organ donation employing altruism as the main appeal is contested and some propose using solidarity or reciprocity as alternative prosocial appeals. This qualitative study explored views of people from diverse Israeli groups (29 focus groups) and medical professionals (140) regarding the appropriateness of employing these 3 moral appeals in organ donation. The analysis presents frameworks of contrasting conceptions of altruism that point to potential unintended effects when applying a restrictive conception. It also identifies communication challenges associated with introducing solidarity or reciprocity as prosocial and value‐laden persuasive 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.