The question I have been asked most often during both halves of my career, first as a fundraiser and now as a philanthropy scholar, is: “Why do people give?” Often it is a genuine enquiry into the most common reasons that prompt people to donate their own money voluntarily. Sometimes it is phrased as a challenge, goading me to expose the “real”, self-interested motivations that the questioner believes prompt donations, such as dodging tax or as a cover for bad behaviour.

Luckily for me the question “why do people give” has a simple answer that is supported by reams of research, as well as by a moment's reflection on your own charitable donations: people primarily give for personal reasons. Most of the time, most people donate to issues and causes that have touched their lives, for better or worse. This is why Cancer Research UK is the top fundraising charity in the UK, because half of us will receive a cancer diagnosis at some point in our lives, and everyone has loved ones with this disease. Children's char-ities and animal welfare charities are also among the most popular fundraising causes because of our universal experience of being a child, the commonplace experience of being a parent and the widespread ownership and enjoyment of pets. Nonprofit organizations focused on cancer, kids and kittens achieve wide spread support because they are aligned with common personal experiences and preferences, and because it is easy to feel affinity with their beneficiaries (Breeze 2013). Some of the most significant and well-known major philanthropic efforts are driven by the same sort of personal factors.

When John D. Rockefeller's baby grandson Jack died of scarlet fever in 1901, he “grieved profoundly” and decided to establish the first institute in the US to focus on biomedical research (Hirsch 2011: 278). Since 1910, the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research has produced 26 Nobel Prize winners, played a key role in discovering DNA and advancing the science of cell biology, and contributed to understanding and curing a range of diseases including meningitis, pneumonia, African sleeping sickness and cancer (Rockefeller University, n.d.).