Giving Money versus Giving Time: The Effect of Moral Compensation on Evaluation of Transgressions

After committing a moral transgression, people are more willing to give their own money and time—two very valuable resources—for prosocial causes, as a way to compensate. But can the method of compensation influence the way individuals evaluate their own transgressions? Rather than distinguishing between money and time, research in the moral regulation literature has often treated the two as interchangeable resources. However, based on prior research showing that money and time have distinct psychological meanings, the present research shows that the method of compensation can differentially influence individuals’ evaluations of their own past misdeeds. Drawing upon the theoretical framework of moral credits and credentials, I posit that donating money allows individuals to feel as if they are accruing moral credits by which they can “pay off” any moral debts incurred through transgressing. In contrast, I posit that volunteering time allows individuals to establish moral credentials, which are specific to the domain of the charity and are not transferrable to unrelated transgressions. Across multiple experiments, I demonstrate that, following a transgression, individuals who compensate with money (versus time), by giving to an unrelated charitable cause, feel less guilty about their past misdeed and perceive the behavior to be less immoral. Conversely, when the charitable cause is related to the transgression, compensating with time or money both reduce guilt and other negative evaluations associated with the transgression similarly. These results have important implications for understanding how people regulate their moral emotions and behaviors.

Department dc:contributor.department

Management

Year dc:date.issued

2015

Author dc:creator

• Wan, Jing

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Aggarwal, Pankaj

• Charitable giving
• Money
• Moral regulation
• Time

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1807/71399

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:utoronto.scholaris.ca:1807/71399