Sleep quality and sleep duration are associated with charitable donations: Evidence from two population-based surveys

Insufficient sleep alters emotional processing, leading to mood disturbances, reduced gratitude, and potentially the withdrawal of compassionate helping. Using data from two national surveys, we investigated whether sleep quality and sleep duration were associated with willingness to donate to local charities and places of worship.

We conducted secondary analyses of two Gallup-administered studies that used random address-based sampling methodologies to approximate population-representative samples. BRS-5 included 1501 respondents and BRS-6 included 1336 respondents (independent samples). Each survey inquired about sleep quality and whether participants had donated in the last year to local organizations and places of worship. In addition, BRS-5 included questions about sleep duration.

In both studies, participants who had better sleep quality and better sleep durations were more likely to donate charitably to local organizations and places of worship (ORs of 1.07-1.45). Most associations remained significant when accounting for age, gender, and income.

Better sleep was associated with a greater likelihood to donate charitably. Experimental work is needed to determine if the relationship between sleep health and prosocial behaviors is uni- or bi-directional.