Predicting Voluntary Blood Donation Among American College Students

Theoretical Background and research questions/hypothesis: Blood safety is a critical issue worldwide. People die prematurely because of insufficient, safe blood suppliers. Although a broad range of negative and positive motivators of blood donation have been identified by previous studies, some findings regarding the effectiveness of these determinants have been contradictory. Also, the theoretic basis for most donor studies has been weak. Several studies applied the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to the area and revealed some interesting insights. However, the TPB does not take campaign effects and perceived threats of blood shortage into consideration, all of which appear to be essential in the blood donation context. The health belief model (HBM) links the perceived threats and the effects of communication with health behaviors, but does not include a normative component. The purpose of this study was to propose an integrated model to predict blood donation intentions by incorporating the key components in the TPB and HBM. It was proposed that blood donation intentions were a positive function of attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, perceived seriousness, perceived susceptibility, self efficacy, and cues to action.

Methods and Results (informing the conceptual analysis):  A total of 237 undergraduate students with various majors completed the questionnaire that contained assessments of the TPB and HBM components. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis revealed that the TPB variables alone accounted for 30% of the variance in behavioral intentions to donate blood. The HBM components contributed additional 24% of the variance in intentions. Self-efficacy was the most important predictor of the model. Attitudes, subjective norms, and susceptibility also emerged as the influential predictors of blood donation intentions. Perceived behavioral control, perceived severity, and cues to action failed to predict blood donation intentions.

Conclusions:  The findings indicated that the integrated model provided a useful framework for explaining blood donation intentions. Compared with the original TPB, the integrated model had stronger predictive power. The results also showed that individuals were more likely to be willing to donate blood if they had more positive attitudes toward blood donation, perceived more social pressure, perceived greater chances of being influenced by blood shortage, and perceived higher level of self-efficacy. The poor performance of cues to action indicated that exposure to existing campaigns did not motivate respondents to donate blood.

Implications for research and/or practice: The findings revealed that self-efficacy, attitudes, subjective norms, and susceptibility should be targeted by future voluntary blood donation campaigns. Future campaigns should emphasize the positive consequences and social pressure of blood donation. Individuals should also be informed that blood shortage occurs more frequently than they thought. Additionally, blood donation campaigns should include “how-to” information to establish individuals’ confidence in their abilities to donate blood. Future research is required to investigate the message features that would present the above mentioned information in an effective way.