Generous People Are Rarely Single-Issue Donors

This week marks the 25th anniversary of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty. Taking place each year on October 17, this day was created to motivate action on eradicating extreme poverty, violence and hunger in the world. Though the challenges seem overwhelming, there are good reasons to have hope about global poverty, especially when it comes to the Church’s role, and many American adults are forging ahead in the fight. But who are these people, and what motivates them? In this infographic from The Good News About Global Poverty, a new Barna report produced in partnership with Compassion International, we look at the correlation between donating to causes aimed at eradicating global poverty and other acts of engagement and compassion.

The More You Care, the More You Care
American adults who donate to help children in extreme poverty are also generous in other areas of their lives, are anchored by an active faith and are more concerned about a range of other important issues. That is, caring about global poverty means caring about other issues. The data shows that interest and investment in the fight against global poverty goes hand-in-hand with a generous outlook toward many social issues they could help with—and is associated with actually doing something about these causes. Whether concern begets action, or action begets concern, the data suggests an encouraging cycle of engagement and compassion.

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About the Research
The data in this report originated from a series of research studies conducted by Barna Group of Ventura, California.

Phone interviews and web-based surveys for U.S. Adults were conducted among a representative sample of adults over the age of 18 in each of the 50 United States. Once data was collected, minimal statistical weights were applied to several demographic variables to more closely correspond to known national averages. Protestant senior pastors were recruited from publicly available church listings covering 90 percent of U.S. churches. Data were minimally weighted to match church characteristics from the National Congregation Study for denominational affiliation, church size and region.

Photo by Nina Strehl on Unsplash