Table II.
Motivations for donating sperm.
| Sperm bank Donors | Online Donors | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Median (Interquartile Range) | Median (Interquartile Range) | p | |
| Motivations* | |||
| I don’t want to have children myself | 2 (3) | 3 (3) | .001 |
| Want to help others | 5 (1) | 5 (0) | .001 |
| To enable others to enjoy parenting as I have myself | 4 (2) | 5 (1) | .006 |
| Financial payment | 3 (2) | 1 (2) | .001 |
| Confirmation of my own fertility | 4 (1) | 3 (4) | .048 |
| To pass on my genes | 4 (2) | 4 (1) | ns |
| To have children/procreate | 4 (3) | 4 (2) | .011 |
| Personal experience of infertilitya | 2 (3) | 3 (4) | ns |
| Knowledge of infertility amongst family/friendsb | 3.5 (2) | 3 (3) | ns |
| Knowledge of egg or sperm donation amongst family/friendsc | 3 (3) | 3 (3) | ns |
| To do something valuable and worthwhile | 4 (1) | 5 (1) | <.001 |
| My sperm would go to waste otherwise | 3 (3) | 4 (2) | <.001 |
| No reason not to | 3 (1) | 4 (2) | ns |
| Other reason | 2 (1) | 4 (4) | ns |
Mann Whitney U tests conducted
aThe option given to online donors was ‘My partner is infertile or has fertility problems’
bThe option given to online donors was ‘Family/friends have experienced infertility’
cThe option given to online donors was ‘Family/friends have used sperm or egg donation’
*Scale ranged from 1 ‘not at all important’ to 5 ‘very important’