Charities provide many vital services for New Zealand society; however, charities are in constant need of donations from the public in order to provide these services. The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between situational optimism/pessimism and donating intentions. Two hundred and fifty three people from the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand took part in experiment. Participants were randomly assigned to one of five conditions in which they viewed an optimistic, pessimistic or neutral (control) image and were asked to rate their intention to donate to a disaster relief charity. When covariates were controlled for, the results revealed that people who saw the pessimistic image were more likely to intend to donate than participants who looked at optimistic image. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.