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Disease advocacy organisations (DAOs) are critical for raising awareness about illnesses and supporting research. While most studies of DAOs focus on personally affected patient-activists, an underappreciated constituency are external allies. Building from social movement theory, we distinguish between beneficiary constituents (disease patients and their loved ones) and conscience constituents (allies) and investigate their relative fundraising effectiveness. While the former have credibility due to illness experience that should increase fundraising, the latter are more numerous. Our study is also the first to investigate where DAO supporters fundraise-through friendship- versus workplace-based networks-and how this interacts with constituent types. Our large-scale dataset includes 9372 groups (nearly 90,000 participants) active in the 'Movember' campaign, a men's health movement around testicular and prostate cancer. We find robust evidence that groups with more beneficiary constituents raise significantly greater funds per participant. Yet because conscience constituents are more numerous, they raise the majority of total aggregate funds. We also find an interaction effect: beneficiary constituents do better in friendship networks, conscience constituents in workplaces. Our findings bear implications for DAOs, indicating they may benefit by encouraging disease patient families to fundraise through friends, and for external allies to focus requests on workplace networks.

Introduction: Hearing is crucial for a child's development, influencing speech, cognition, and emotional well-being. Early detection of hearing disorders is vital, yet India faces challenges in implementing effective newborn hearing screening (NBHS) programs. This research explores the perspectives of audiologists, focusing on the major and minor challenges faced and current protocols followed across diverse setups in India. Method: A two-phase study involved questionnaire development and data collection from 116 audiologists nationwide. The survey addressed demographics, current practices, challenges faced, and opinions on NBHS improvements. Results: Findings revealed disparities in screening protocols, with 42 variations reported. Challenges included ambient noise control, communication gaps, and lack of interdisciplinary support. Audiologists emphasized the need for sensitizing healthcare professionals, free screening, and increased manpower to enhance NBHS efficacy. Conclusion: The study aligns with global challenges in NBHS program implementation. Rural areas face a shortage of audiologists, emphasizing the necessity to train community health workers. The varied screening protocols and delays in screening timeframe underscore the need for standardized guidelines and increased funding. Audiologists play a pivotal role in NBHS success. To overcome challenges, standardizing protocols, sensitizing healthcare professionals, and promoting community-based screening are crucial. The study emphasizes proactive measures among audiologists, continual research, and collaboration to enhance evidence-based practices and policy improvements in newborn hearing screening. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Charitable fundraising increasingly relies on online crowdfunding platforms. Project images of charitable crowdfunding use emotional appeals to promote helping behavior. Negative emotions are commonly used to motivate helping behavior because the image of a happy child may not motivate donors to donate as willingly. However, some research has found that happy images can be more beneficial. These contradictory results suggest that the emotional valence of project imagery and how fundraisers frame project images effectively remain debatable. Thus, we compared and analyzed brain activation differences in the prefrontal cortex governing human emotions depending on donation decisions using functional near-infrared spectroscopy, a neuroimaging device. We advance existing theory on charitable behavior by demonstrating that little correlation exists in donation intentions and brain activity between negative and positive project images, which is consistent with survey results on donation intentions by victim image. We also discovered quantitative brain hemodynamic signal variations between donors and nondonors, which can predict and detect donor mental brain functioning using functional connectivity, that is, the statistical dependence between the time series of electrophysiological activity and oxygenated hemodynamic levels in the prefrontal cortex. These findings are critical in developing future marketing strategies for online charitable crowdfunding platforms, especially project images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Geriatric Interprofessional Team Transformation for Primary Care (GITT-PC) is a model developed to deliver optimal care to older adults in primary care. GITT-PC is an expansion of the John A. Hartford Foundation Geriatric Interdisciplinary Team Training (GITT) program developed at New York University and funded from 1995 to 2002 (Fulmer et al., 2004). GITT was designed to create training models that reflect the needs of the changing health care system and the challenge of caring for older adults with complex conditions (Fulmer et al., 2005). The GITT-PC model builds on the lessons learned from GITT and the development of curricula and training materials based on best practices. Methods: Implementation of GITT-PC is accomplished through systems and practices that meet the needs and preferences of patients and their families and that are implemented by teams of health professionals and community service providers. GITT-PC is focused on four core components of high-quality geriatric care: (1) health promotion and prevention, (2) chronic disease management, (3) advanced care planning, and (4) transitional care management, each component corresponding to a Medicare-reimbursable visit. Results: Implementation of these reimbursable services enables practices to provide evidence-based geriatric care while realizing a potential significant return on investment. Conclusions: The GITT-PC model has evolved from an academic training program to a financially sustainable model that serves to improve the care of older adults through a systematic team transformation process that makes a clear business case for primary care (Tabbush et al., 2021). The GITT-PC training program can be implemented in primary care practices with a focus on improving or expanding delivery of annual wellness visits (AWVs) and, potentially, registered RN-led AWVs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States is facing a surge in the aging population, which will increase the demand for services and supports that allow older adults to age independently. This study assessed the size and value of the volunteer labor force in two home- and community-based programs funded under the Older Americans Act (OAA). Using publicly available program data for fiscal years 2015–2019, we calculated the annual contribution of volunteers, based on the total number of volunteer hours and share of labor effort, and estimated the economic value of volunteers in these OAA programs. In fiscal year 2019, volunteers contributed a total value of $1.7 billion in the OAA Title III program and $14.0 million in the Title VII long-term care ombudsman program. These results highlight the value of volunteers in OAA programs and the need for policies to support volunteers in the aging services network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: A donation for a candidate can be motivated by support for that candidate or by opposition to the candidate's opponent. This study tests the impact that race, gender, and party affiliation of the candidate and the candidate's opponent have on the candidate's fundraising. Methods: This study uses data from the 2016, 2018, and 2020 U.S. congressional elections to estimate a regression model where the dependent variable is funds raised by each mainstream party candidate, with party, race, and gender of the candidate and the candidate's opponent accounted for in the model, as well as district competitiveness, district economic and demographic characteristics, and whether the seat is open. Results: Female Democrats and non‐white male Democrats have a fundraising advantage when running against a white male Republican. Female Republicans or non‐white male Republicans do not have this advantage when running against white male Democrats. Conclusion: The interaction effects of gender and race on fundraising for a candidate and opponent are different depending on party affiliation, and the characteristics of both the candidate and the candidate's opponent must be considered for these effects to be visible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For decades, scholars, non-governmental organisations and observers have expressed concern about the use of sensationalised images of people in the developing world in non-governmental organisation fundraising advertisements. They fear that these negative messages, often known as 'poverty porn', lead to a perception of people in developing countries as helpless and lacking in agency. Despite this ongoing concern, there has been no empirical assessment of the effect of exposure to these negative messages on the perceptions of people living in poverty in developing countries. Our research employs an online experiment of 450 UK respondents to address this gap. It examines how watching charity advertisements affects people's perceptions of the agency of those in poverty in developing countries. We find that those who viewed negative portrayals of those in poverty were more likely to rate people in poverty lower on measures of agency. This empirically validates the criticisms of these types of negative advertisements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on how 92 parochial incumbents, 80 assistant clergy, and 94 Readers in the dioceses of Exeter and Truro rated the importance of various tasks in their ministries, how well they felt equipped to do those tasks, and their priorities for ministry and training. Preaching, leading worship, and pastoral care were rated as most important, while management and administration, talking about giving and raising money, and speaking up on local issues were rated as least important. The largest gaps between importance of a task and being equipped for it were supporting personal wellbeing for incumbents, equipping disciples for assistant clergy, and bringing others to faith for Readers. Top ministry priorities were equipping lay ministries, team working, and supporting evangelists; lowest priorities were remaining faithful to received traditions, maintaining the parish system, and developing digital ministries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing popularity of fusing adventure, humanitarianism, and travel has received attention from scholars within the fields of leisure and tourism studies, particularly regarding widespread activities such as volunteer tourism. Fewer have examined the phenomenon that we refer to as endurance philanthropy, in which participants journey long distances under challenging conditions to increase awareness and raise funds for specific causes. As more and more people become attuned to the idea, it is essential to interrogate the power dynamics and development discourses that frame such campaigns. To begin this necessary conversation, this paper investigates one subset of the endurance philanthropy movement: participants who have journeyed from North America to Central America to raise money and awareness for causes situated within the destination region. Using the lenses of spectacle and critical development, we analyze online media produced both by and about these journeyers. Our findings highlight key themes that weave across and through these events: actions not words, expedition completed, grit and determination, and donor commitment. We argue that these events – while emphasizing solidarity and advocating for social change – ultimately undermine the potential for such transformation due to the spectacular, individualizing, and apolitical characteristics of the campaigns. This results in the reproduction of neoliberal self-help models of progress, which reinforce the status quo and downplay larger structural issues that keep poverty and inequality in place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Online donation platforms have grown increasingly established in the past two decades. Among substantial research into donation‐based crowdfunding platforms in general, no studies address the intention to use matching donation platforms. The latter refers to a hypothetical product, not currently available on the market. It represents an extension of conventional donation platforms, aligning donors' preferences with NPOs and projects present on the platform. Drawing on the technology acceptance model (TAM), this exploratory study empirically investigates factors that influence the intention to use a matching donation platform. It also extends the TAM to include trust and donation processing factors and considers the perspectives of both donors and nonprofit organizations (NPOs) engaged in fundraising. The data include an online survey of 458 donors and 112 NPOs in Germany. The findings indicate that all factors, including trust and donation processing, within the extended TAM exert a significant impact on the intention to use a matching donation platform, and attitude toward the platform represents the most influential factor. This article also provides entrepreneurial recommendations for how a matching donation platform can be implemented and used in practice. For example, a matching donation platform should aim at younger donor target groups and provide NPOs with suitable options for processing donations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prosocial crowdfunding has achieved a growing audience by providing a financing source for entrepreneurs in the microfinance space. Using data from Kiva, a leading prosocial crowdfunding platform, we examined whether there is a right time to launch a crowdfunding campaign. This is the first study to unravel the role of temporal patterns in securing funds in emerging markets. Our results indicate a reverse turn-of-the-month effect on the fully funded campaigns. We further identified a "positive winter prosocial effect" and a "positive first-half-of-the-week effect" on successful fundraising. As such, our study highlights relevant similarities between financial markets and crowdfunding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers news briefs related to dental field as of May 1, 2024. Topics include a trial demonstrating the effectiveness of an alcohol reduction app in reducing drinking, parliamentary support for raising tobacco sale age, and research highlighting potential risks of moderate alcohol consumption during pregnancy leading to birth defects.

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Everyone has an opportunity to contribute to climate solutions. To help people engage with this opportunity, it is critical to understand how climate organizations and fundraisers can best communicate with people and win their financial support. In particular, fundraisers often rely on practical skills and anecdotal beliefs at the expense of scientific knowledge. Fundraisers could be motivated to achieve a substantial boost in funding for climate solutions, if there is evidence of the financial gains that sciencebased fundraising makes available. In this Perspective, we provide a preliminary foray into such evidence. We bring together findings from philanthropic research and climate psychology to identify what factors can help captivate donors. Then, through an experimental study of a charitable appeal for a climate charity, we show how putting these factors into practice may contribute toward an increase in donated money. This provides optimism that evidence-based fundraising can inspire donors to contribute much-needed resources toward climate solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Email spam is more than just annoying. It is costly, both to the individual and to society. This Comment examines these costs through the lens of one type of spam: political fundraising emails. It also proposes two types of solutions. The first is “front-end” regulation, which could include a do-not-email registry or an outright ban on unsolicited bulk email. This type of regulation would address the spam problem by decreasing the overall amount. The second type of solution is “back-end” regulation, meaning subject-line labeling and a requirement that spammers stick to one sender name. This would tackle the problem by decreasing the costs of receiving each spam email. This Comment weighs the advantages and disadvantages of each approach, ultimately concluding that Congress should pursue back-end regulation first because it is more likely to survive First Amendment scrutiny. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been growing interest in exploring factors that influence the success or otherwise of welfare policies in democratic countries, such as the interrelationships between the proposed policy and the context it will be introduced into, such as the sociodemographic characteristics of the population and the population's previous experience with welfare policies. However, there has been little exploration of factors that could influence general population support for long-term care for older people. The aim of this study was to investigate the general population's attitudes for determinants of high-quality aged care and different mechanisms for funding and any impact of individual characteristics on these. A representative sample of the Australian general population aged 18 years and over (N = 10,315, 52% female, 22% aged 65 years and over) drawn via quota sampling participated in the survey online. Participants were asked to rate the importance of a list of 10 determinants of quality care and their support for four models of funding, both using a five-point Likert scale. We identified consistently high expectations for long-term care services across the general population, especially among older people, females, those with a family member in care, and those living in rural or regional areas. In terms of how governments practically fund a high-quality long-term care system, we also identified broad support among the general population for both payment of a co-contribution towards the cost of care by older people using services and increased government funding for the system. Over 40% of participants said they would be willing to pay additional tax to improve access and quality of aged care services. While often neglected by governments in the past who assumed voter apathy on the topic, by comparison, our findings indicate that there is currently a strong appetite among the general population for improvements to the quality of care provided and that they are willing to consider changes to the funding model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In life, Jimmy Savile was revered as Britain's greatest charity fundraiser. In death, he is remembered as Britain's most notorious pedophile. Raising over £40 million for good causes throughout his media career, a year after his death several investigations revealed a history of abuse of hundreds of children, mostly young girls, across the institutions he worked or volunteered at. Using the framework of the symbolic power of charity, this article documents how these crimes were either missed or covered up. Savile used his fundraising prowess and the "good glow" of his reputation to enable his abuse and shield him from discovery. Institutions prioritized their reputation or fundraising income over bad publicity and proper safeguarding. Drawing on a growing critical literature, this is the first article to explore the role of Savile's charity in his crimes and highlights the increased concern over charity's role as a tool of reputation laundering for elites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comprehensive sex education (CSE) is evidence-based, addresses a wide variety of topics, and is inclusive of sexual and gender minority (SGM) experiences. However, teachers are often not trained to deliver CSE and are uncomfortable teaching it. This can lead to the omission of important topics and leave youth dissatisfied with their sex education. Thus, more research is needed to understand educator needs/approaches when delivering sex education and how educators incorporate SGM-affirming content. We conducted fifteen interviews with sex educators in Metro Vancouver, British Columbia (BC), Canada, in autumn 2021, to understand current approaches to and gaps in the provision of CSE. We used an interpretive descriptive methodology. Personal and structural factors constrain the delivery of CSE in BC. Personal factors include motivation, teacher comfort/knowledge, personal trauma, and fear of pushback. Structural factors include inequitable access to parent advisory council funding, Learning Standards design, and the peripheral nature of sex education. Participant recommendations for the future of sex education include increased mandatory pre-service and in-service training, the implementation of "sex education mentors" in each district, an online hub of resources, and government funding for community-based educators. We recommend (1) that government funding be allocated for at least one trained sex educator in every school district who can coach and mentor teachers; (2) the creation and promotion of an online information hub which includes lesson plans, videos, and resources for teachers; (3) and that teachers' colleges create mandatory courses on teaching CSE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Charities that fundraise from the public can feel competing pressures to be as efficient as possible in their fundraising efforts and to accurately and ethically reflect their services and beneficiaries in their fundraising materials. At the same time, the number of donors giving to charity is in a long-term decline. These pressures may lead charitable managers to make tradeoffs when designing and implementing their fundraising programs. In this case study, two direct mail solicitations using different types of beneficiaries from one Canadian charity are examined to see how those trade-offs affect fundraising results. When aggregated, the differences between an out-group beneficiary profile and an in-group beneficiary profile appear subordinate to larger market-level externalities when all else is held equal. When disaggregated, there appears to be a change in donor behavior at the lower end of donation amounts in some markets and community types. The results of this study suggest that fundraiser tactics that narrow in on the preferences of a small segment of donors may be contributing to declining numbers of donors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to place on record the impact made on government policy and research by Autism Cymru, a small charity that existed in Wales between 2001 and 2014. The success of Autism Cymru resulted directly from philanthropic funding, applied with strategic vision and genuine ambition. Design/methodology/approach: A retrospective, chronological viewpoint highlighting the creative process, drawing upon records held by the charity. Findings: Autism Cymru initiated the concept and played a crucial role in steering the development of government policy for autism in Wales between 2001 and 2011. The charity also drove forward the initiative, which led to the establishment of the Wales Autism Research Centre at Cardiff University in 2010. This paper demonstrates that with astute philanthropic support, small learning disability/autism charities can elicit structural and sustainable change at the national level, leading to wide-ranging benefits for the communities they represent. Originality/value: The strategic approach taken over 20 years ago in Wales by Autism Cymru, which led to the Welsh Government's ASD Strategic Action Plan for Wales (Welsh Government, 2011), set in place a national policy model, which was then followed by The Scottish Strategy for Autism and the Northern Ireland Autism Strategy (Department of Health, 2013>; Scottish Government, 2011). The insightful and tenacious method used by Autism Cymru remains relevant today, demonstrating that any small charity supported by shrewd philanthropic funding can punch well above its weight by taking a planned, ambitious and strategic approach to policy, research and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Project success is a major challenge to the sustenance of crowdfunding platforms constituted for donation. While previous studies have recognized the importance of source reputation, establishing a credible reputation remains a formidable task for project founders. This study proposes a novel idea of achieving credibility through bundling, in which crowdfunding campaigns collaborate with similar projects (project bundling) or external entities (ideological bundling). This study examines how these two bundling strategies affect crowdfunding outcomes. Further, the study explores how sources of reputation and size establish boundaries of bundling. Using data from Mchanga.com, our analysis reveals a diverse effect of collaborative fundraising on the success of donation crowdfunding. Specifically, our findings indicate that project bundling positively impacts campaign success, whereas ideological bundling has a negative effect. The study contributes to the literature on bundling, credible reputation, and collaborative fundraising on digital platforms. This research also provides insights for practitioners to successfully manage donation-based crowdfunding campaigns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The main goal of the work is to analyze how social workers identify their specific competencies regarding the general characteristics of the workplace and how they subjectively evaluate their abilities and capabilities to fulfill these competencies in the Ústecký region in Czechia. Methods: The data were obtained from a combined convenience online and paper-pencil survey. Respondents were employees of the 48 social services organizations in the Ústecký region: 101 females and six males. The one-factor analysis of variance comparing means and two non-parametric tests, the Friedman test and Kendall's W test, was employed, as well as Spearman's rank correlation coefficients for data analysis. Results: The most significant part of the working time of the respondents is devoted to the administration working with clients. Social workers primarily use communication skills and knowledge of social work methods. On the other hand, they use language skills and research methods sparingly. Respondents recognize the essential skills to solve crises, make quick decisions, and control their emotions. On the other hand, they consider writing project applications, raising money, managing people, and creativity the least necessary skills. The respondents find demanding administration the most difficult. On the other hand, they have the most minor problems with identifying clients' needs, determining the goals and methods to achieve them, and working with clients from different cultural backgrounds. The respondents mostly solve the dilemmas of the number of clients and time constraints of the social worker, as well as practical problemsolving and legislative constraints. Conclusion: The social workers' activities are divided into administrative and direct work with people. Communication skills and knowledge of social work methods are considered most important for fulfilling professional duties. The possibility of finding quick solutions in a crisis helps them to achieve these duties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we focus on entrepreneurs' passion as a signal in influencing fundraising success via equity crowdfunding. Moreover, we look at the role of entrepreneurs' task-specific experience – industry and startup experience- and company control in influencing the credibility of passion as a signal. Through a text analysis of 606 equity crowdfunding campaigns in the UK, we found that entrepreneurs' displayed passion positively influences funding success and that entrepreneurs' startup experience reinforces the credibility of this signal, i.e., the impact of passion on fundraising success. Additionally, we found that when entrepreneurs retain more shares of the company, the influence of displayed passion on funding success is greater. Our study contributes to the crowdfunding literature highlighting the importance of entrepreneurs' passion in influencing fundraising success via crowdfunding, and what influences the credibility of passion as a signal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whether proxied by the amount raised or the probability that this amount exceeds the soft cap, the factors driving the fundraising success of token offerings have changed considerably over the past 4 years. Possible factors include target market capitalization for the token, genuine signals of the venture's public credibility, price and momentum of ether, domicile of the venture and distribution of the token. There is a large previous literature on this topic, rooted in the entrepreneurial finance and crowdfunding literature, with numerous hypotheses based on signalling theory in its broadest sense. But due to substantial differences in samples, which end before 2020, the results are not only mixed but out of date. We have built the largest and most complete dataset on token offerings, spanning 2017 and 2022. The determinants of the amount raised were robust to different subsamples until the market virtually disappeared during the Covid pandemic. But it resumed in early 2021 and within 12 months had reached an all‐time high in terms of number if not market capitalization of new offerings. During this period the market changed completely, with success now depending mostly on the type of token offering and the choice of launchpad platform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]