EAMONN FERGUSON eamonn.ferguson@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Health Psychology
The prototypical UK blood donor, homophily and blood donation: Blood donors are like you, not me
Ferguson, Eamonn; Bowen, Sarah; Mills, | Richard; Reynolds, Claire; Davison, Katy; Lawrence, Claire; Maharaj, Roanna; Starmer, Chris; Barr, Abigail; Williams, Tracy; Croucher, Mark; Brailsford, Susan R
Authors
Sarah Bowen
RICHARD MILLS Richard.Mills2@nottingham.ac.uk
Research Fellow
Claire Reynolds
Katy Davison
Claire Lawrence
Roanna Maharaj
CHRIS STARMER chris.starmer@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Experimental Economics
ABIGAIL BARR Abigail.Barr@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Economics
Tracy Williams
Mark Croucher
Susan R Brailsford
Abstract
Background and Objectives
Homophily represents the extent to which people feel others are like them and encourages the uptake of activities they feel people like them do. Currently, there are no data on blood donor homophily with respect to (i) people's representation of the average prototypical UK blood donor and (ii) the degree of homophily with this prototype for current donors, non-donors, groups blood services wish to encourage (ethnic minorities), those who are now eligible following policy changes (e.g., men-who-have-sex-with-men: MSM) and recipients. We aim to fill these gaps in knowledge.
Materials and Methods
We surveyed the UK general population MSM, long-term blood recipients, current donors, non-donors and ethnic minorities (n = 785) to assess perceptions of the prototypical donor in terms of ethnicity, age, gender, social class, educational level and political ideology. Homophily was indexed with respect to age, gender and ethnicity.
Results
The prototypical UK blood donor is perceived as White, middle-aged, middle-class, college-level educated and left-wing. Current donors and MSM are more homophilous with this prototype, whereas recipients and ethnic minorities have the lowest homophily. Higher levels of homophily are associated with an increased likelihood of committing to donate.
Conclusion
The prototype of the UK donor defined this as a White activity. This, in part, may explain why ethnic minorities are less likely to be donors. As well as traditional recruitment strategies, blood services need to consider broader structural changes such as the ethnic diversity of staff and co-designing donor spaces with local communities.
Citation
Ferguson, E., Bowen, S., Mills, |. R., Reynolds, C., Davison, K., Lawrence, C., Maharaj, R., Starmer, C., Barr, A., Williams, T., Croucher, M., & Brailsford, S. R. (in press). The prototypical UK blood donor, homophily and blood donation: Blood donors are like you, not me. Vox Sanguinis, https://doi.org/10.1111/vox.13731
Journal Article Type | Article |
---|---|
Acceptance Date | Aug 9, 2024 |
Online Publication Date | Sep 2, 2024 |
Deposit Date | Sep 5, 2024 |
Publicly Available Date | Sep 5, 2024 |
Journal | Vox Sanguinis |
Print ISSN | 0042-9007 |
Electronic ISSN | 1423-0410 |
Publisher | Wiley |
Peer Reviewed | Peer Reviewed |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1111/vox.13731 |
Keywords | demography; equality; ethnicity; homophily; prototype; social class |
Public URL | https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/39171443 |
Publisher URL | https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/vox.13731 |
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The prototypical UK blood donor, homophily and blood donation: Blood donors are like you, not me
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Publisher Licence URL
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Copyright Statement
© 2024 The Author(s). Vox Sanguinis published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of International Society of Blood Transfusion.
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