An Empirical Examination of Formal and Informal Volunteering in Canada

Using data from the 2008 General Social Survey of Canada, this study examines the factors associated with individuals’ propensity to engage in formal and informal volunteering. The results show that social networks increase the likelihood of both formal and informal volunteering, but social trust and human capital increase only the likelihood of formal volunteering and not of informal care. The findings also reveal interesting cultural influences and regional differences in the propensity to engage in formal and informal volunteering, especially between French-speaking Canadians and English-speaking Canadians, and those living in Quebec and outside of Quebec. Native-born Canadians are more likely to volunteer than their immigrant counterparts, but they are similar to immigrants in the propensity to provide informal care. Additionally, women are found to be more likely to engage in formal volunteering and informal care than men. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Influences of Resources and Subjective Dispositions on Formal and Informal Volunteering

This study investigated the influences of resources and subjective dispositions on formal and informal volunteering. The author examined whether resources are associated with formal volunteering, while subjective dispositions are associated with informal volunteering, using data from representative national Japanese samples (SSP-P2010 data). The results suggested that socioeconomic resources (namely education) are more strongly related to formal volunteering than to informal volunteering, while subjective dispositions (empathy and religious mind) are associated with both formal and informal volunteering. The main finding of the present study was that empathy and religious mind are the essential facilitators of both types of volunteering with different characteristics.     

The Role of Religiosity for Formal and Informal Volunteering in the Netherlands

This paper deals with the question: To what extent do individual religious characteristics, in addition to collective religious characteristics, contribute to the explanation of formal and informal volunteering in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 21st century? To answer this research question, we used the SOCON 2005–2006 dataset. Our main finding concerns informal volunteering: we found that spirituality increases the likelihood of informal volunteering, implying that openness to other people’s needs increases the likelihood of the actual provision of help. There are no other aspects of religiosity that are related to informal volunteering. With regard to formal volunteering we found that, in line with previous research, religious attendance is related positively to formal volunteering, religious as well as secular volunteering, which can be regarded as support for the proposition that religious involvement is important for norm conformity. Further, having a more religious worldview decreases the likelihood of formal volunteering which might show that those with a strong religious worldview are more concerned with the ‘otherworldly’ and less so with what they do in this world. We found no influence of individual religious characteristics on formal volunteering. These results confirm the idea that integration into a religious community plays quite a large role in explaining formal volunteering. Informal volunteering, however, seems to be independent of social networks: it rather depends on individual motivation.     

Locating Gender Neutrality in Formal and Informal Aspects of Organizational Cultures

This article describes and analyzes the practices that conceal gender at work in the contexts of different organizational cultures. The case studies on which I base my discussion derive from clerical work in two organizational settings. The interpretation I suggest is that regardless of their sex, age or hierarchical position at work, employees regard gender as a personal and intimate issue that, with the exception of pay, does not belong to the sphere of work. Gender issues raise questions that disturb the preferred harmony in everyday life in workplaces. Consequently, the employees seemed to think that hierarchical differences are located in society at large, not in their own workplaces. The analysis shows that age, position and technology shaped differences not only between women and men in organizations, but also among female clerical workers. Thus the results relate both to the practical realities at work and to the gender identities of clerical employees in their organizational cultures.     

Neighborhood Association Participation and Formal Volunteering in Japan

We examine the effect of participation in neighborhood association (NHA) activities on volunteering using the 2010 Japanese General Social Survey data. We find that controlling for established predictors of formal volunteering such as demographic and socioeconomic variables, NHA association participation, either operationalized as a dichotomous or interval variable, positively predicts volunteering. Moreover, some of the established predictors of volunteering (e.g., marital status and associational membership) are useful in predicting NHA participation. Our results indicate a complementary relationship between volunteering and NHA participation. We discuss implications of our study for future research on community volunteering in Japan and elsewhere.     

Informal Care vs. Formal Services

Longitudinal data from a representative sample of community-residing older persons were used to document changes in patterns and costs of care, both informal and formal. It was found that use of formal services was usually in conjunction with, and secondary to, informal care. Limited availability of informal care as well as increased disability raised the odds of using services. Substitution of formal services for informal care was limited and usually temporary. Total costs of community care, including living expenses, were generally less than the cost of nursing home care.     

Formal and Informal Social Controls of Employee Deviance*

Using the phenomenon of deviance by employees against the rules of the formal work organization as the behavior of interest, the differential saliences of both formal (i.e., management) and informal (i.e., co-worker) sanction severity are empirically compared. As hypothesized, the perceived threat of informal sanctions by one's fellow co-workers explains both property deviance and production deviance far better than the perceived severity of the more formal responses initiated by management. Further, if the two forms of social control are causally ordered, we find that management actions to constrain deviant employees do have an effect, albeit indirect, in that formal sanctions operate on deviance indirectly by shaping the informal sanctions.     

Informal Volunteering and Socialization Effects: Examining Modelling and Encouragement by Parents and Partner

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - Informal volunteering is seen as an important indicator of social relations and community life. We therefore investigate...     

Trade-Offs Between Formal Home Health Care and Informal Family CareGiving

Using 1994 National Long Term Care Survey data, we estimated logistic regressions of formal and informal home health care use and hours. Home health care use and intensity were differentially impacted by chronic conditions, are higher for Medicaid enrollees and rural or small town residents, but lower for HMO enrollees. Decreases in the probability of home health care use increased informal instrumental activities of daily living (IADL) support four hours and decreased informal activities of daily living (ADL) support eight hours weekly. IADL caregiving substituted for formal care, but ADL caregiving declined with reductions in formal care. Public policy reducing formal home health care access may reduce informal ADL caregiving and increase informal IADL caregiving, producing net declines in support.     

Gender Role Ideology and the Gender Based Differences in Earnings

Much of the research on gender differences in occupational earnings still focuses on human capital and the structure of the labor market. However, these variables rarely explain even half of the gender gap in earnings. Most research has examined the impact of gender role ideology as it impacts occupational choice, which indirectly can impact earnings. Using data from the National Opinion Research Center General Social Surveys, this research focuses on the relationship between attitudes about gender roles and two variables: (a) earnings, and (b) occupational positions held by women and men. Findings show that traditional gender-role ideology contributes to lower observed earnings for both males and females, independent of the influences of human capital characteristics, occupational context, and ascribed characteristics. Results support socialization as a partial explanation for the gender-based earnings differences and suggest that, to the extent that economic rewards are used to assess the value of gender role expectations, traditional gender role attitudes might continue to change and lead to relatively equal earnings among women and men.     

The Effects of Social Trust and Institutional Trust on Formal Volunteering and Charitable Giving in Japan

This study is part of the growing literature on the effects on civic engagement of attitudinal predictors, such as trust, along with structural predictors. Drawing data from the 2005 Japanese General Social Survey, it examines the association between trust and the probabilities of formal volunteering and charitable giving. A bivariate probit analysis of the data suggests that trust, institutional trust in particular, matters more to predict giving than volunteering. Although the number of membership affiliations is positively and significantly associated with both types of civic engagement, the association between membership affiliations and formal volunteering is significantly greater. Implications of these and other findings are discussed for future studies linking trust to civic engagement in group-collectivist societies such as Japan.     

Volunteering to Assist the Homeless: Public Service and Individual Differences

Abstract

The present investigation examined the effects of three public service announcements (PSAs) on undergraduates’ willingness to volunteer to assist the homeless at a local emergency shelter. A PSA designed to arouse empathy in listeners generally yielded a higher rate of volunteering to assist the homeless than either a self-oriented PSA or an unemotional, other-oriented PSA. The PSA designed to arouse empathy was found to be especially effective in promoting volunteering in individuals who scored relatively high on trait affective empathy and who, in turn, reported a relatively strong empathic response to this message.     

Gender Differences in Managerial Intention

This study focuses on existing gender differences within management and within vertical career mobility. Some theoretical explanations of these differences are discussed, with behaviour and motivation theories as the base for the present study. The influence of different variables, such as outcome expectancies, perceived self-efficacy, subjective norm, work-role salience and perceived motivating job characteristics are examined. Data were gathered in two separate organizations. It was hypothesized that the motivation for a managerial job is less for females than males, which can be explained by the variables under study. In both studies perceived self-efficacy was the most important predictor of intention to assume a managerial job. Multiple regression analysis revealed significant relationships among the different variables of the theoretical model and the strengths of these relationships. In one of the two organizations, men showed a greater disposition to a managerial job, and their perceived self-efficacy was higher. It is concluded then that managerial intention can be influenced by the organizational context.     

Gender Differences in Divorce Adjustment

Gender differences in divorce adjustment were inves- tigated. It was concluded that there is sufficient evidence to demon- strate that males report less stress prior to the decision to divorce than do females, and that females fare better after separation and divorce than do males. It is argued that measures of divorce adjust- ment are either direct or indirect measures of self-esteem, and that gender differences in self-esteem exist prior to divorce and therefore account for gender differences in adjustment after divorce. It is fur- ther suggested that gender differences in the moderators of divorce adjustment (i.e., in attachment, initiation of divorce, and degree of social support) are related to gender roles and serve to reinforce gender differences in adjustment to divorce.     

Differences in the Gender Speech

This paper mainly talks about the main features of gender speech. There are some social reasons behind those salient features of differences in gender discourse. Even slight different speech structure may bring conflicts to them. Last, it is shown that it is possible for men and women to have a nice talk with each other.     

Internet Use and Volunteering: Relationships and Differences Across Age and Applications

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - The internet plays an important part in our daily lives. In this paper, we ask whether internet use is negatively related...     

The Influence of Gender Equality on Volunteering Among European Senior Citizens

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - This research analyzes how gender equality influences the participation of European senior citizens in a range of...     

The Role of Formal and Informal Groups in Providing Help to Older People

No abstract available for this article.     

Individual and Gender Differences in Sexual Self-Perceptions

Abstract

A study was conducted to explore the perceptions that individuals have about the sexual component of their self-concept while paying particular attention to gender differences. A list of sexual traits was created that described various components of an individual's sexuality. As predicted, we found that males rate themselves higher on explicitly sexual dimensions (e.g., sexually responsive, experienced) and females perceive themselves to be more romantic and sexually attractive. We also examined how some individual difference variables (masculinity-femininity, erotopho-bia-erotophilia, and sexual experience) may be associated with people's perceptions of their sexuality. For males, masculinity was associated with higher self-ratings on sexual traits related to sexual experience and responsiveness, whereas for females, femininity was associated with higher self-ratings of romanticism and attractiveness. Also, we found that erotophiles and sexually experienced individuals perceive themselves as more sexual than erotophobes and less experienced individuals. The results were discussed in terms of traditional theories about the self-concept and suggestions for further investigations of these issues were noted.