Digital Altruism Millions of people are using the Internet to act altruistically: from adding content to educational websites, like Wikipedia, to donating unused computing time to help researchers find cures for diseases; from playing online games that feed the hungry, to clicking, or watching videos, that donate to charity, etc. Dr. Klisanin's research in digital altruism reminds us that the best aspects of human nature are present online. (Klisanin, 2011) 

Digital Altruism

In 2011, we published the first research exploring “digital altruism” — since then, it’s become an integral facet of social impact media. Link to the original research here, or read a bite-sized overview below.

Excerpt from Time, by Kharunya Paramaguru

“Dana Klisanin, a U.S.-based psychologist, suggests that the Internet is indeed giving rise to new avenues for altruism. She refers to this as “digital altruism”— simply meaning altruism that’s mediated by digital technology—and suggests that it is an understudied area because so much media attention is focused on negative behaviors online, like cyber-bullying or cyber-crime. Klisanin has suggested three categories for various degrees of online altruism. This includes “every day digital altruism” where individuals click to donate to a charity, to creative digital altruism where users design websites or platforms to help others, to co-creative projects where groups or corporations come together to produce something for the “greater good”—like the UN working with online humanitarian volunteers to help with relief efforts following typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines.”