Barbara Masser

University of Queensland | UQ · School of Psychology

Background The UK's Infected Blood Inquiry (IBI) highlighted a major public health scandal, with at least 30 000 people infected and more than 3000 deaths attributable to infected blood and blood products. This study investigates the impact of the IBI announcement on May 20, 2024, on public perceptions of blood supply risk, safety, and donation int...

Background Blood services must consider innovative ways to encourage more Black people to donate to enhance the efficacy of treatments. We evaluate how two innovative arts‐based approaches (co‐designed and locally produced films and a large‐scale Marvel Studios'/NHSBT collaboration) can achieve this by generalizing to a wider audience from their ta...

Background Currently in Australia, men are deferred from donating blood if they have had sex with another man within the past 3 months. However, a proposed gender‐neutral assessment (GNA) process will ask all donors questions about sex with new or multiple recent partners, with deferral based on responses to a question about anal sex. Understanding...

Our objective is to review motives and barriers for non‐reproductive, living substance of human origin (SoHO) donation, and to extend existing typologies beyond blood. The expansion of SoHO collection is currently unmatched by increased living donors. Thus, there is a critical need to understand how to effectively recruit and retain donors to ensur...

In recognition of the impact of whole‐blood donation on body iron stores, there has been an increased focus assessing the efficacy of strategies to minimise the risk of iron deficiency (ID). Whilst donor behaviour is an important determinant of success, this literature is yet to be fully synthesised to help guide blood collection agencies when impl...

Background Despite word-of-mouth (WOM) and electronic WOM (eWOM) influencing people’s willingness to donate blood, no research has explored this behavior among blood service employees who are also donors. This underexplored segment is highly important, as they are generally committed to both the organization and the cause and are likely more inform...

To meet the priority healthcare needs of any population there must be a consistently available blood supply donated by willing donors. Due to this universal need for blood, retaining blood donors remains an ongoing challenge for blood services internationally. Encouraging psychological ownership, or the feeling of ownership one experiences over a p...

Effective interventions that support blood donor retention are needed. Yet, integrating an intervention into the time-pressed and operationally sensitive context of a blood donation center requires justification for disruptions to an optimized process. This research provides evidence that virtual reality (VR) paradigms can serve as a research envir...

Background With a decrease in young and first‐time donors, applying gaming elements to blood donation may provide a novel means of encouraging young donors. In August 2023, the online game DiabloIV launched the Blood Harvest in which players were encouraged to donate blood products in the United States to receive virtual in‐game rewards. Given the...

This study examines how the institutional context informs the ways in which healthy recipients relate to genomic information. Through focus group data, it considers the trend of blood collection agencies (BCA) moving to extend donor genotyping. We investigated how receipt of genomic information is viewed as fitting into the contract of altruistic,...

Background In Australia, a man cannot donate blood if he has had sex with another man within the past 3 months. However, this policy has been criticized as being discriminatory as it does not consider lower risk subgroups, and led to calls for modifications to the policy that more accurately distinguish risk among gay, bisexual, and other men who h...

Background Health research is often driven by the desire to improve the care and health of the community; however, the translation of research evidence into policy and practice is not guaranteed. Knowledge translation (KT) activities, such as dissemination and end-user engagement by researchers, are important to achieving this goal. This study exam...

Background Athletes are a key group from which likely eligible donors could be sourced. While blood donation has been popularized as detrimental to athletic performance, little is known about how athletes perceive blood donation. The aim of this study was to investigate athletes' perceptions of the impacts of donating blood on their athletic perfor...

Background: Health research is often driven by the desire to improve the care and health of the community; however, the translation of research evidence into policy and practice is not guaranteed. Knowledge translation (KT) activities, such as dissemination and end-user engagement by researchers, are important to achieving this goal. This study exa...

Explaining why someone repeats high-cost cooperation towards non-reciprocating strangers is difficult. Warm glow offers an explanation. We argue that warm glow, as a mechanism to sustain long-term cooperation, cools off over time but can be warmed up with a simple intervention message. We tested our predictions in the context of repeat voluntary bl...

Background: Blood collection agencies (BCAs) hosting stool (fecal or poo) donor programs report high rates of donor deferral. However, the impact of deferral on willing donors, in terms of personal well-being and future engagement with BCAs, remains unexplored. Accordingly, we surveyed those attempting to donate intestinal microbiota about their e...

The health and well-being of volunteer donors is of critical concern for blood collection agencies responsible for ensuring a stable supply of blood products. However, lay understandings of the impact of donating blood on health remain poorly understood. As lay perceptions are likely to influence critical decisions about donation, understanding the...

Background: Vasovagal reactions (VVRs) are one of the primary reasons for people to stop donating blood. The aim of this study was to evaluate the impact of newly developed online communications on the rate of return of whole-blood (WB) and plasma donors who experienced a VVR. Study design and methods: First-time and experienced WB and plasma do...

Background: Reliable estimates of the population proportion eligible to donate blood are needed by blood collection agencies to model the likely impact of changes in eligibility criteria and inform targeted population-level education, recruitment, and retention strategies. In Australia, the sole estimate was calculated 10+ years ago. With several...

Background: Translation of research knowledge is critical to ensure transfusion medicine policies and practices reflect current evidence and so effectively support the health of blood donors and recipients, as well as ensuring ongoing blood supply. The aim of this study was to investigate the barriers and facilitators of knowledge translation (KT)...

Background and objectives: Interventions to retain existing donors are essential to increase the blood supply. Blood donor self-identity is proposed to motivate sustained donation behaviour. However, interventions to develop self-identity in the absence of donating blood are scarce. We propose that experiencing psychological ownership of a blood c...

Millions of nonprofits compete for a share of the billions of dollars donated to charity each year. Yet how donors select which charities to support remains relatively understudied. Social norms influence whether people give to charity at all, but no research has yet considered whether norms also communicate information about which causes group mem...

Issue Addressed Sexual violence is an important public health issue affecting significant numbers of university students across Australia and internationally. In response, online modules have been widely implemented and there is an urgent need to better understand their effectiveness. The aim of this study was to evaluate an online sexual violence...

Background: Donor milk banks have strict donor screening criteria to ensure that donor milk is safe for premature or hospitalized babies. Yet little evidence is available to understand how potential donors, who are often breastfeeding their own infants, experience being ineligible ("deferred") to donate their milk to a milk bank. Materials and Meth...

Background Genomic testing is already used by blood collection agencies (BCAs) to identify rare blood types and ensure the best possible matching of blood. With ongoing technological developments broader applications, such as identification of genetic markers relevant to blood donor health, will become feasible. However, the perspectives of blood d...

Background: Fear is a recognized predictor of vasovagal reactions (VVRs) in blood donors. However, less is known about the role of other emotions, including positive emotions, that donors might experience. The aim of this study was to identify the emotions experienced in center that predict onsite VVRs, and to determine at what point during the do...

Background: Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, Australian donors aged 70 and over were advised to temporarily stop donating. The aim of this research was to understand the factors associated with some of these donors continuing to donate despite the advice, and whether adherence to the advice had negative implications for donor retention. Study desi...

Nonprofits address some of the world's most pressing problems, and many rely on donations to fund their essential work. Nonprofit marketers are, therefore, tasked with promoting charitable giving. Research on giving has largely focused on identifying the characteristics that make people generous but has generated inconsistent findings, suggesting i...

Rape victim testimony may seem incongruent with the ‘real rape’ stereotype and appear more consistent with typical consensual sex. This research investigated whether having victims describe stereotype-consistent events early in their testimony guides jurors to construct narratives of the evidence that are consistent with rape and depict the defenda...

Background: To inform the development of interventions to retain donors following a vasovagal reaction (VVR), the aim of this study is to use the Health Action Process Approach (HAPA) to identify predictors of intentions to re-donate and actual return behavior among whole blood (WB) and plasma donors who experienced a VVR. Study design and method...

Background: Blood collection agencies (BCAs) worldwide are continuously looking to improve recognition, reward, and incentive (RRI) policies to optimize the recruitment and retention of blood donors. However, given the inconsistent categorization and variety of strategies available, there is a need for a theoretically informed and empirically supp...

The victim’s testimony in most rape trials is unlikely to match jurors’ rape stereotypes and may instead seem typical of consensual sex. This research investigated whether providing judicial education about what commonly occurs in rape, and having a victim describe stereotype-consistent events early in their testimony, would guide jurors to interpr...

Millions of charities compete for donations, yet no empirical study has examined patterns of shared giving behavior across the nonprofit sector. To understand which types of charities are more likely to share donors, we conducted a social network analysis using behavioral data from 1,504,848 donors to 52 large charities in Australia. Three hypothes...

Advocacy is intended to change people's attitudes and behavior. Yet the psychological and behavioral consequences of advocacy have rarely been considered. Across 3 experiments (combined N = 934) in the contexts of debates around racial discrimination and abortion, we investigated if and how exposure to advocacy can influence collective giving respo...

Diversification of blood collection agencies' (BCAs) core business requires donors to donate substances of human origin (SoHO) beyond whole‐blood. Whole‐blood donors are assumed to be willing to convert to donate other SoHO as well as whole‐blood. However, no reviews consider the evidence on conversion (i.e., willingness/intention, behaviour, reten...

Background and Objectives The COVID-19 pandemic brought about changes to daily life as measures to contain the spread of the virus increased across the world. The aim of this survey was to assess the psychological impact of the pandemic on young professionals (YPs) in transfusion medicine. Materials and Methods A cross-sectional web-based survey w...

Background and Objectives Maintaining a panel of committed anti-D donors is crucial for the production of anti-D immunoglobulin to prevent haemolytic disease of the foetus and newborn. Given low numbers of donors in the Australian panel, there is a need to better understand motivators and barriers specific to anti-D donors. Materials and Methods A...

Introduction: As many countries change to opt-out systems to address organ shortages, calls for similar reform in Australia persist. Community perspectives on consent systems for donation remain under-researched, therefore Australian perspectives on consent systems and their effectiveness in increasing donation rates were explored. Design: In this...

Jurors are less likely to believe a victim of rape when the events she describes are inconsistent with the rape stereotype and appear more consistent with what occurs in consensual sex. This research investigated whether presenting stereotype-consistent events early in a victim’s testimony can lead jurors to evaluate the other events described as d...

Background Many blood collection agencies are generating important data on donor health outcomes using large-scale blood donor cohort studies. Such studies can be very effective when donors provide access to linkage of their data to external health databases, and storage and genomic testing of their blood sample. In this study, we aimed to assess t...

Nonprofit organization (NPO) marketers are now increasingly turning online to recognize donors, with little understanding as to how online donor appreciation influences behavior. A scenario-based research design using an online survey was administered to a random sample of voluntary blood donors ( n = 356). The findings contribute to identity theor...

Rationale Blood collection agencies face ongoing challenges in retaining voluntary donors to meet the demand for blood and blood-related products by healthcare services. A known deterrent to continued blood donation is the experience of a vasovagal reaction (VVR). However, there has been little research into donors’ experiences of these reactions a...

Background Against a background of declining blood donor numbers, recruiting new donors is critical for the effective operations of healthcare providers. Thus, interventions are needed to recruit new blood donors. Purpose We provide initial evidence for Voluntary Reciprocal Altruism (VRA) to enhance nondonors’ willingness to become blood donors. V...

Background and objectives With greater numbers of Australians living longer with healthier lives, older adults could make a greater contribution to whole‐blood and plasma donor panels. Understanding the experiences and attitudes of middle‐aged to older Australians towards blood donation may provide opportunities to develop strategies to engage, rec...

Background Knowledge translation focuses on the transfer of research findings into policy and practice. To provide insight into the state of knowledge translation in blood donor research, we undertook a rapid review of a key research area in the field with high potential for translation, vasovagal reactions (VVRs). We examined the number and nature...

Background: Fear of blood donation is implicated in vasovagal reactions, donor recruitment, and retention. This study examined the extent to which fear among donors is associated with various donor outcomes in an Australian sample, and whether fear can be addressed on-site to reduce adverse reactions and improve the donation experience. Study des...

With the changing ethnic composition of the Australian population there has been a growing number of patients requiring transfusions of rarer blood types. People from ethnic minority groups are generally less likely to donate blood and this can lead to shortages for some patients from these communities. In this article we report the findings of a q...

Family discussion of donation wishes is a critical driver of family authorisation of organ donation. However, few people discuss their wishes or feel certain of family member’s donation preferences. Empirically, individual determinants of discussing donation wishes with family have been examined using the theory of planned behaviour (TPB). The impa...

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is common and has a lasting negative impact on the health and well-being of victims and survivors. People’s mental frameworks (schemas) of IPV are central in allowing them to identify and respond to IPV. Early recognition of IPV is essential to reducing the cumulative harm caused by repeated instances of abusive beha...

Objectives To determine the motivators and barriers to COVID‐19 convalescent plasma donation by those in the United Kingdom who have been diagnosed with or who have had symptoms of SARS‐CoV‐2 (COVID‐19) but who have not donated. Background Convalescent plasma from people recovered from COVID‐19 with sufficient antibody titres is a potential option...

Background O‐negative donors are a critical resource for blood collection agencies, and their recruitment and retention provides an ongoing challenge. Motivational interviewing shows promise as a tool to promote donor retention, although concerns about scalability remain. The current study examined the effect of an automated Web‐based interview dra...

Universal stool banks rely on, but face difficulties recruiting, community volunteers to donate stool for faecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) to effectively treat recurrent Clostridioides difficile. This study sought to identify determinants of community members’ willingness to donate stool to guide donor recruitment. 397 Australian residents (...

Universal stool banks rely on, but face difficulties recruiting, community volunteers to donate stool for faecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) to effectively treat recurrent Clostridioides difficile. This study sought to identify determinants of community members’ willingness to donate stool to guide donor recruitment. 397 Australian residents (...

Background This study compared the likelihood of return to donate and donation rate ratio by age of donors at their first donation when followed up to 12 years. Study Design and Methods Donation history of two cohorts of first‐time donors (those donating in 2007 and 2013) was extracted until March 2019 from Australian Red Cross Lifeblood's nationa...

Victims of intimate partner violence (IPV) face significant barriers to having their complaints believed both when initially reporting their experiences and when giving evidence at trial. This is especially the case when they have been sexually assaulted by their partner. These barriers stem not only from misperceptions about what IPV is, but also...

Shame, embarrassment and disgust may discourage people from donating stool or avoid the topic altogether. Within health communication, there is increasing interest in the role of humour to dispel these emotions or increase acceptance of unappealing or threatening information that elicits negative emotions. There is also evidence to suggest that hum...

Background Blood collection agencies (BCAs) are expanding core business by inviting blood donors to donate stool for fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT). However, whether blood donors also want to donate stool is unclear since, despite its benefits, stool donation is viewed by many as unpleasant. This study examined the prevalence, contributors...

The warm-glow of giving is one mechanism proposed to account for high levels of human cooperation. However, little is known about how warm-glow can be harnessed to sustain long-term cooperation to benefit wider society (vaccinations, blood donation). We argue that the power of warm-glow to sustain long-term cooperation cools offs over time but can...

Background and Objective Recruiting and retaining male donors remain an ongoing challenge for blood collection agencies. Research suggests that interventions based on costly signalling theory that allows donors to unobtrusively but publicly signal their donor status may be effective. However, what functions as such a signal and how it is interprete...

Background and objectives: Blood Collection Agencies in several countries have implemented strategies to increase the number of plasmapheresis collections. Despite this, a sizable minority of plasma donors lapse from donation each year, with little research conducted on this topic. An understanding of the plasma donation experience from the perspe...

Background: Despite recognition that blood donation is an affectively poignant process, many aspects of donors' emotional experiences and their consequences remain unexamined. Purpose: This study tracked the donor's experience of several positive and negative emotions live as they arose during the donation process and tracked the impact of that...

Millions of charities compete for donor dollars, yet why people prefer to give to particular charities remains poorly understood. Informed by the social identity approach, and using mixed methods, we analyzed open‐ended responses from a global donor survey (N = 1,849 from 117 countries) to understand why participants see their favorite charity as i...

Embarrassment can lead to avoidance of potentially embarrassing situations and contexts. Stool donation is relatively unfamiliar to most people, and the substance itself or the act of donating may induce embarrassment or shame in potential or actual donors. As such, potential or actual donors may be deterred from donating stool because they feel sh...

BACKGROUND: With the COVID-19 pandemic continuing to accelerate and blood collection agencies (BCAs) warning of shortages, it is critical to identify the current determinants of donor behavior for donors and non-donors. STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: In May and June 2020, Australian residents who believed themselves eligible to donate blood responded...

Background and Objectives In 2018, Australian Red Cross Lifeblood changed its plasmapheresis eligibility criteria to allow donors to donate plasma without the requirement of a prior successful whole blood donation. This study evaluated the impact of this policy change on donor retention and donor safety. Materials and Methods All donors who had at...

While substantial research has been conducted on intimate partner violence (IPV), comparatively little research has examined peoples’ perceptions of which behaviors comprise this form of abuse. Early identification of IPV is critical to ending abuse, however, forms of IPV that typically occur earlier in a relationship (e.g., nonphysical abuse) may...

In the context of the global COVID‐19 pandemic, blood collection agencies (BCAs) around the world are operating under unprecedented conditions. As social scientists in donor research in Canada, Australia, and the Netherlands, we provide some early observations on donor and public responses to the pandemic and identify areas for donor research movin...

In the context of the global COVID-19 pandemic, blood collection agencies (BCAs) around the world are operating under unprecedented conditions. As social scientists in donor research in Canada, Australia, and the Netherlands, we provide some early observations on donor and public responses to the pandemic and identify areas for donor research movin...

BACKGROUND As demand for plasma‐derived products grows, retention of voluntary nonremunerated plasmapheresis donors is crucial for many blood collection agencies. Currently, there is limited evidence of how to encourage first‐time plasmapheresis donors to return and establish a high‐frequency donation routine. This study tested the effectiveness of...

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to understand Australian donorsʼ and nondonorsʼ orientations toward 13 noncash incentives for blood and plasma donation and the associations between orientations and intention to donate (nondonors) and subsequent donation (donors). STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS A survey of 1028 donors and 1201 nondonors was conducte...

Across two studies (Ns = 265 and 735), we investigated whether women’s endorsement of hostile (HS) and benevolent sexism (BS) moderate their experience of collective threat and subsequent hostility toward traditional and non-traditional female subtypes. As expected, HS was positively associated with intra-gender hostility towards the non-traditiona...

Background: A new national donor safety initiative was introduced in Australia in 2018, which aimed to encourage all whole blood donors to water load and to use applied muscle tension. This study evaluated the effect of this initiative on the rate of vasovagal reactions (VVR). Study design and methods: Routinely collected data were used to ident...

Objectives This study examined relationships between home and community gardening and older adults’ self-reported psychosocial and physical well-being, attitudes to aging relative to gardening activities and benefits of membership to a gardening group. Methods A survey addressing (a) demographic characteristics, (b) gardening interests and sentime...

Background: This study examined the impact of age and sex of first-time donors who had not experienced an adverse event or deferral on their likelihood of and time to return. Study design and methods: On behalf of the Biomedical Excellence for Safer Transfusion (BEST) Collaborative, international blood collection agencies (BCAs) were invited to...

Background and objectives: Encouraging existing plasma donors to donate more frequently is a key objective for blood donation services committed to expanding yield through voluntary non-remunerated plasmapheresis donation. This requires an understanding of donors' perspectives on their current donation practice and how this relates to their knowle...

Background: Blood donor recruitment remains an important worldwide challenge due to changes in population demographics and shifts in the demand for blood. Various cognitive models help predict donation intention, although the importance of affective deterrents has become increasingly evident. This study aimed to identify fears that predict donatio...

Thousands of patients globally with recurrent Clostridioides difficile would benefit from Faecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT). However, the number of eligible volunteer stool donors do not meet demand, and it is challenging and costly to recruit donors. Based on a rapid review of FMT donor research, and brief reviews of complementary research (...

Background Potential blood donors can be deferred due to concerns about the impact of the donation on their health or the safety of the blood supply. To date, we lack a comprehensive review of the impact of deferrals on donors and how to mitigate adverse effects. Aims The aim of this review was to describe the available literature on deferrals, wi...

Background: This study examined the impact of donor adverse events (DAEs) on plasma donor return and compared these against trends in whole blood (WB) donors. Study design and methods: Using a retrospective cohort design, donors who attempted to give plasma or WB in 2014-2015 were categorized by DAE and followed for 2 years. Analyses of return r...

Background: Research on the recruitment and retention of blood donors has typically drawn on a homogeneous set of descriptive theories, viewing the decision to become and remain a donor as the outcome of affectively cold, planned, and rational decision-making by the individual. While this approach provides insight into how our donors think about b...

Background: Research on the recruitment and retention of blood donors has typically drawn on a homogeneous set of descriptive theories, viewing the decision to become and remain a donor as the outcome of affectively cold, planned, and rational decision-making by the individual. While this approach provides insight into how our donors think about bl...

In the context of decreased demand for whole blood and increased demand for plasma‐derived products, donors in Australia are increasingly being asked to convert from whole‐blood to plasmapheresis donations. Plasmapheresis is a different type of donation to whole blood as the process takes longer and can be engaged in more frequently. What is unknow...

In order for jurors to decide a legally correct verdict, they must comprehend and apply jury instructions. To date, empirical research has focused on jurors’ comprehension of instructions. However, it is difficult to know how well jurors actually comprehend instructions, because the tests currently used by researchers to measure jurors’ comprehensi...

In the context of decreased demand for whole-blood and increased demand for plasma-derived products, donors in Australia are increasingly being asked to convert from whole-blood to plasmapheresis donations. Plasmapheresis is a different type of donation to whole-blood as the process takes longer, and can be engaged in more frequently. What is unkno...

See article on page 1267–1272, in this issue

Gender, age, religiosity, and political orientation are often associated with a propensity to give to charity. However, these broad associations mask inconsistencies that are not yet understood. Just as identity plays an important role in shaping consumer choices generally, donors’ identities could explain diverging associations between demographic...

OBJECTIVES The aim of this research was to test a model integrating self‐determination theory (SDT) and the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) to predict intention to donate blood. BACKGROUND Social science research suggests that motivational orientations outlined by SDT can be usefully integrated with constructs from the TPB to collectively predic...

Background Blood donation is a prosocial altruistic act that is motived by the mechanisms that underlie altruism (e.g. warm‐glow, reciprocity, fairness/trust). Because there is consistent evidence that altruism and its mechanisms show cross‐cultural variability, in the present paper we make the case for a cross‐cultural perspective in blood donor r...