An Empirical Test of Educational Donors’ Satisfaction Levels in Donating for Education before and after the COVID-19 Era

Adopting expectancy–disconfirmation theory and the cycle of satisfaction, this study examined the dynamic nature of the satisfaction cycle and identified the moderating roles of satisfaction and adjusted expectations in the context of sustaining educational donations. Using a three-time-lag survey, we showed that the sequential shifts from prior expectations (T1) to satisfaction (T2) to adjusted expectations (T3) were consistent with the expectance–disconfirmation mechanism. We found that the carryover effect between prior and adjusted expectations is significantly powerful. In addition, we found that the two mediators—satisfaction and adjusted expectations—absorb the effect of prior expectations and then transfer that effect to behavioral intentions over time. Therefore, this study provides a theoretical account of the link between prior expectations–satisfaction–behavioral intentions and prior expectations–adjusted expectations–behavioral intentions during donation activities.