Growing the Volunteer Pool: Identifying Non-Volunteers Most Likely to Volunteer

There are ongoing management and societal challenges affecting volunteering participation. These place a premium on organizations identifying individuals that currently do not volunteer but have the willingness and capacity to do so, the “Potentials”. Supplementing the limited non-volunteer literature, we seek to quantify this potential volunteer pool using constructs aligned to the willingness, capability and availability dimensions from Meijs et al.’s (Volunt Action 8:36–54, 2006) volunteerability framework. Using binary logistic regression testing with a nationally representative sample of Australian volunteers and non-volunteers, we found partial support for the framework’s willingness and capability dimensions determining volunteer status. We then applied a predictive equation to the non-volunteer sample to calculate their percentage likelihood of volunteering, to identify a cohort of “Potential” volunteers. Further testing revealed statistically significant differences between this cohort compared to other non-volunteers based on various interventions for promoting volunteering. The implications of our novel study and an associated research agenda are discussed.

     

American High School Students’ Perceptions of Determinants of Life Satisfaction

Life satisfaction can be assessed either globally or with regard to satisfaction with specific domains of life. The latter multidimensional approach presumes science has delineated with confidence the specific domains most relevant to evaluating whether the criteria for a good life have been met. This paper shares results of a qualitative study of the perceived determinants of life satisfaction among 30 high school students who were diverse in terms of mental health; 6–10 participants were classified as complete mental health, vulnerable, symptomatic but content, or troubled at two time points separated by a year. Thematic analyses of transcribed individual interviews suggested eight themes that capture the domains of life adolescents perceive influence their happiness. These themes are compared and contrasted to domains included in existing multi-dimensional measures of youth life satisfaction. The factors likely to be particularly salient to students with different levels of mental health are noted.

     

捐赠繁荣中国研究

一名学友的慷慨捐赠为伦敦国王学院新成立的中国学院提供了助力。该礼物将用于设立“华人企业家研究”讲师职务,为英国大学历史上第一次设立此类职务。     

Access to justice for Aboriginal People in the Northern Territory

This article discusses research in the Northern Territory on Aboriginal civil and family law needs. It is based on focus group discussions and interviews with legal services providers and other associated organisations. The article argues that key areas of legal need involve discrimination, housing, child protection, social security, credit/debt and consumer law problems. It further argues that welfare conditionality, particularly as embodied in the NT Intervention and subsequent Stronger Futures policies, has exacerbated the need for legal assistance and advocacy for Aboriginal people.     

Longitudinal Relations of Parental Influences and Adolescent Career Aspirations and Actions in a Collectivist Society

Using social cognitive career theory as a framework, we examined the longitudinal effects of proximal parental contextual influences on career aspirations and actions in a collectivist context. We used a sample of 954 Indonesian high school students and measured parental career expectations, adolescent‐parent career congruence, self‐efficacy, outcome expectations, career aspirations, planning and exploration, twice, 6 months apart. The best‐fitting model was reciprocal, with the results showing that parental career expectations predicted subsequent career aspirations and planning, and aspirations and congruence with parents regarding career matters predicted future exploration. Self‐efficacy and outcome expectations were reciprocally related over time. Self‐efficacy served as an across‐time predictor of both parental contextual variables. Career exploration predicted future self‐efficacy and planning predicted later outcome expectations.     

Diversity in National Legislatures Around the World

Men from majority racial, ethnic, and religious groups continue to dominate electoral politics in most countries. At the same time, national legislatures are becoming more diverse. Cross‐national research on inequality in national politics focuses most often on women, but occasionally addresses the political representation of other marginalized groups. This review brings together these distinct areas of research – cross‐national studies on the representation of women and minority groups in national legislatures – to think about diversity in politics in a broader way. Such an approach suggests future studies should: (i) acknowledge important differences among women; (ii) focus on more than one type of minority group at a time; and (iii) explicitly examine variation in the overrepresentation of majority men as political elites.     

A multi-level cost–benefit approach for regulatory decision support in food safety and quality assurance scenarios

In complex policy decision situations where policy objectives cannot be reached alone through the aggregate actions of individual actors, the classical approaches for measuring the effects of regulatory initiatives such as cost–benefit analysis do not provide the information necessary for decision support. This paper discusses a framework for a multi-level analysis approach that could provide decision support in multi-level policy decision situations.