The effects of a personal phone call prompt on blood donor commitment.

There is a need to investigate procedures that can motivate individuals to attend blood drives. Low rates of attendance are partly due to the failure of many to fulfill their pledges to donate blood. This study examined the use of personal phone calls to prompt college-age blood donors to fulfill their commitments. The results indicated that a remainder call was effective in prompting pledged donors to attend a college drive. The phone call prompt might have been effective because of the social pressure which the recruiter exerted on the donors. Implications of these findings for blood donor recruitment efforts as well as the field of community psychology are discussed.