IACM VSS Session – More Need, Less Help
More Need, Less Help: Major Disasters Create A Supply-Demand Divergence In Prosocial Organizational Behavior
Session Discussants: Polly Kang & David Daniels
Length: 45 minutes
Date: April 20, 2026
Session at Local Times:
|
US Pacific
|
8:00 AM
|
|
US Eastern
|
11:00 AM
|
|
Amsterdam
|
5 P.M.
|
|
Singapore
|
11:00 PM
|
|
Melbourne
|
2 A.M. *
|
*Next day
Abstract:
A prevailing view in the organizational and social sciences is that when more people need help, more people will step up to provide it (“more need, more help”). However, we theorize and demonstrate that the opposite phenomenon (“more need, less help”) can also occur under certain conditions. We propose that although traumatic shocks (large-scale negative exogenous events) will often increase help-seeking behavior, they can also decrease help-giving behavior – because such high-stakes situations can induce distress not only among help-seekers but also among help-givers, who consequently may find it harder to provide high-effort help to others. We test this view by analyzing data from volunteer crisis counselors at a large nonprofit organization. By empirically comparing disaster days (days when plausibly random major disasters happen) to non-disaster days, we find that major disasters indeed increase help-seeking behavior while simultaneously decreasing help-giving behavior. This juxtaposition produces a supply-demand divergence in externally directed prosocial organizational behavior – i.e., “more need, less help.” We further show that when disasters lead to relatively more fatalities, the effects of disasters on both help-seeking behavior and help-giving behavior are amplified. In placebo tests, as expected, we find no “effects” of major disasters during pre-disaster days, boosting confidence in our causal inference approach. Our findings help uncover a crucial boundary condition: although the prevailing “more need, more help” assumption likely holds in low-stakes situations (consistent with prior research), this assumption can break down in high-stakes situations involving high-effort prosocial behavior – leading to “more need, less help.”
Bio:
Polly Kang is currently an Assistant Professor at Nanyang Technological University. She theorizes and tests how feelings drive decisions in negotiations and organizations, and how people can lead more productive, generous, and fulfilling lives. In particular, most of her work combines massive datasets with cutting-edge quantitative tools (from statistics, econometrics, and machine learning) to identify how contextual factors causally influence motivation and behavior in natural field settings, using natural field experiments and quasi-experiments. Her research is published in top academic outlets such as Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, and has been covered by major media outlets such as TIME.
David P. Daniels is a Presidential Young Professor at NUS Business School. He holds a Ph.D. in Business Administration from Stanford University. His research focuses on influence, negotiation, and decision making; motivation (e.g., prosocial behavior); and groups and organizations (e.g., diversity). His research is published in top academic outlets such as Organization Science, Research in Organizational Behavior, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, and Journal of Consumer Research. He is the founder of the Diversity in Management and Organizations (DMO) conference. His research has been covered by media outlets such as Harvard Business Review, TIME, Forbes, PBS, NPR, and NBC.
Thank you to Conflict Management Division of the Academy of Management for their continued support of the IACM Virtual Seminar Series.
