Applied Sociology

This thesis examines the possibility of grouping charitable donors by income level to develop a set of models that can more accurately predict charitable donations. Previous work is inconsistent in predicting charitable donations. This work helps to determine if these inconsistencies are a result of methodological differences between researchers, or if group membership is an important factor in predicting charitable donations as suggested by some researchers. This research only found four variables that were common to all three income groups, frequency of church attendance, family income, age, and years of education. Results show that additional variables can serve as predictors of relative donations, but only when samples are grouped by income. This should be considered as evidence that group membership is an important factor to consider in future charitable donations research. These groupings should not be limited to income; other socio-demographic indicators should also be explored in more depth