Perceptual determinants of nonprofit giving behavior Adrian Sargeant a , John B. Ford b, * , Douglas C. West c a Bristol Business School, Bristol, UK b Department of Business Administration, College of Business and Public Administration, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA 23529, United States c Birmingham Business School, the University of Birmingham, UK Received 4 January 2005; accepted 19 April 2005 Abstract This paper provides the first empirically based marketing model of the perceptions of givers and the resulting impact on donations. Within nonprofit marketing there is a considerable amount of extant research to support the view that both extrinsic and intrinsic variables can be used to separate givers and non-givers to nonprofits. However, they are less useful in explaining the level of support that will be offered. Perceptual factors may offer more utility in this regard. Structural equations models are presented based on a survey of over 1300 donors that link a series of perceptual determinants to the level of the average donation to a specific organization. The potential mediating roles of trust and commitment are also explored. Trust appears unrelated to the direct benefits that accrue to donors as a consequence of their gift. Rather, trust (and indirectly, commitment) is predicated on the perceived benefits supplied to beneficiaries and the manner in which the impact of these benefits is communicated back to donors. D 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction This paper builds on the extensive and broad based literature underpinning nonprofit marketing and delineates a group of perceptual factors that might influence individual support of charitable organizations. Its main contribution is to provide the first empirically based marketing model of the perceptions of givers to non- profits and the resulting impact on donations. The focus is on the individual determinants of giving as a subset of factors that have been postulated to impact on donor behavior (cf., Bendapudi et al., 1996). Thus, factors pertaining to the wider fundraising environment, the fundraising techniques employed and the nature/portrayal of beneficiaries have all been deliberately excluded from our analysis. Attempts have previously been made to develop a broad perspective on why individuals might give to voluntary organizations based on synthesizing the liter- ature (see especially Bendapudi et al., 1996; Burnett and Wood, 1988; Guy and Patton, 1989). However there is, as yet, little empirical work on donor perceptions of the recipient organization and the role that these might play in stimulating giving behavior. Equally, previous studies concerned with monetary donations have tended to select the decision to donate or not, as their primary focus (Green and Webb, 1997; Sargeant, 1999), rather than exploring the factors that drive the value of gifts (Schlegelmilch et al., 1992). It also remains unclear the extent to which these factors may impact on giving directly or be mediated through additional constructs such as trust and commitment. To address these issues this paper begins by summariz- ing the factors felt to determine individual giving and highlights the need for further research in relation to donor perceptions of recipient organization(s). The following sections explore the likely relationship between these constructs and giving behavior. A model is then developed and its performance empirically tested against a key structural alternative. 0148-2963/$ - see front matter D 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2005.04.006 * Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 757 683 3587 (Office), +1 757 6230639 (Home); fax: +1 757 683 5639. E-mail address: jbford@odu.edu (J.B. Ford). Journal of Business Research 59 (2006) 155 – 165