University of Sussex Business School researchers Dr Krystallia Moysidou and Dr Smadar Cohen-Chen have been investigating how crowdfunding platforms can shape public views and potentially alter political attitudes and perceptions on individual social responsibility.  

Their recent research Inducing collective action intentions for healthcare reform through medical crowdfunding framing looked at US medical crowdfunding campaigns that adopted a politicised narrative. Their results have shown that these campaigns have the power to induce social attitudes that are conducive to change, however only for political conservatives. Liberals held high collective action intentions for healthcare reform and were not affected by the manipulation of the narrative. 

Dr Moysidou and Dr Cohen-Chen say: 

“Considering that conservatively-oriented individuals are the ones who have traditionally been opposed to a healthcare reform in the US, our results make a valuable contribution towards facilitating an open dialogue on reforming healthcare in the US”.