MOTIVATION OF ALTRUISTIC SPERM DONORS PARTICIPATING IN ASSISTED REPRODUCTION IN RUSSIAN FEDERATION

This article explores the motivations behind Russian men’s altruistic sperm donation using Alderfer's Existence-Relatedness-Growth (ERG) model. Among the sample of 86 men, altru-istic motivation is mostly driven by existence and relatedness. Correlations tests indicated two patterns: 1) men driven by existence needs are more willing to maintain contact with the future child and less prone to self-promotion; 2) men driven by relatedness needs demon-strate the opposite characteristics. These results contribute to further research of reproductive donor motivations in Russia.

The Role of Donations in Building Local School Book Collections in the Ming Dynasty

This article analyses patterns of book donations to local school libraries in the Ming (1368–1644), drawing on a data set made with LoGaRT, a Chinese text mining and processing software created by the Max Planck Institute for History of Science. Records of donated books and other records explaining donor motivations make it possible to show what types of people donated, and what books they selected. Donors gave books on a broad range of topics. Big data makes it possible to identify changes over time and space, and enhances our understanding of book circulation. This article builds on Timothy Brook’s work on Ming school libraries, in which he argued that they had a set of core books issued by the central government, but little else. I argue that donated books were also important for many library collections.

Egg Donation Imaginaries: Embodiment, Ethics and Future Family Formation

This article considers the sociological utility of the ‘imaginary’ for understanding how a growing number of women who seek to conceive using donated eggs might make sense of their future desires, hopes and ambivalences. By combining the imaginary with insights from authors working on ideas about everyday or ‘ordinary’ ethics it considers how deliberations about egg donation take place and how future motherhood is constructed. Three main aspects of what are referred to as ‘egg donation imaginaries’ are defined: ‘imagining donor egg motherhood’; ‘imagining donor motivations’; and ‘imagining the donor’. The article illustrates how the imaginary is a valuable analytical device because it illuminates how ideas, ambivalences, deliberations and reflections about future family building are deeply social, embodied and reflexive. The imaginary advances sociological theorising of reproduction more generally and helps to bridge existing tensions between individual practices and wider social and policy imaginaries.

Crowdsourcing for a better world

Purpose – The purpose of the paper is to better understand the relation between information technology (IT) affordances and donor motivations in charitable crowdfunding. Design/methodology/approach – This paper reports the findings from a comparative case study of two charitable crowdfunding campaigns. Findings – The affordances of crowdfunding platforms support types of donor motivation that are not supported effectively, or at all, in offline charity. Research limitations/implications – For future researchers, the paper provides a theoretical model of the relation between IT affordances and motivations in the context of charitable crowdfunding. Practical/implications – For practitioners in the charity space, the paper suggests why they may wish to consider the use of charitable crowdfunding and how they may go about its implementation. Originality/value – Based on field research at two charitable crowdfunding campaigns, the paper provides a new theoretical model.