MEMORY FOR THE EXPERIENCE OF DONATING BLOOD - JUST HOW BAD WAS IT

A field experiment investigated the accuracy of blood donors' memory for the emotions they experienced during blood donation. Compared to what they reported at the time of donation, the donors remembered a greater contrast between predonation and postdonation emotions. The donors also remembered experiencing more anxiety than they actually did. The bias in memory was especially pronounced among relatively inexperienced donors who had not been asked to report on their emotions prior to their actual donations. The memory bias was also related to donor's attitudes at the time of recall. Donors' intentions to donate blood again were reliably predicted by a combination of attitude and emotion measures. Discussion considers a potential intervention for improving donor return rates.