Measuring the Propensity to Volunteer

As charities are expected to take on more and more of the provision of services to the disadvantaged, they will be calling on volunteers to support that work. The use of volunteers means important cost savings when compared to the use of paid service providers, thus giving one advantage to the voluntary sector when bidding in the mixed economy of welfare. Given the potential for increased use of volunteers, questions of motivation and commitment become very important. Volunteers make up a significant proportion of the human resources used to service social needs, yet previous research has not made it clear why and how volunteers come to give so much of themselves. This research demonstrates that there is an underlying Volunteerism–Activism Attitude which can be measured, and which holds within its four dimensions the key motivations for volunteering. Use of the scale measuring this attitude allows prediction of those people who are most likely (and least likely) to volunteer for charity activity. For charities the scale might provide a useful tool in managing the personnel with whom they are now expected to bid in the quasi-markets of service provision.     

Postretirement work and volunteering by poverty groups informed by role theory

This study uses role theory to examine the association between postretirement work and volunteering among retirees and to determine whether this association varies across poverty status. Data came from the 2012 wave of the Health and Retirement Study (HRS). The sample was restricted to respondents of older retirees (N = 6,619). We found that postretirement work positively influenced volunteering. However, poverty can be a risk factor of volunteering among older retirees. The positive effect of post-retirement work was found to be more significant in the near-poverty group. We provide an empirical foundation to help inform volunteer programs for retirees.     

Assigning volunteer tasks: The relation between task preferences and functional motives of youth volunteers

In this paper we aim to explore the relationship between volunteer motives and task preferences in order to provide volunteer managers with better insight in how tasks can be assigned to keep youth volunteers satisfied. Earlier seminal contributions have either taken a pure functional approach – where various types of motives are supposed to be at the base of any type of volunteer work – or a differentiated approach, where particular motives relate to specific task preferences. However, empirical results reported in the literature do not justify the preference of one approach above the other. To investigate whether one of the approaches is superior, or whether a combination of both is more appropriate, we perform a canonical correlation analysis for a set of functional motives and a set of task preferences (N = 2158). Five distinct relationships (canonical variate pairs) of motives and preferences are found. Results show that a ‘functional basis’ exists where all motives relate to a basic set of tasks. Additionally, a more differentiated approach towards volunteer motives and task preferences has to be taken, as we find four other relationships where specific motives are satisfied by assigning particular sets of tasks.     

Supporting mothers: Issues in a Community Mothers Programme

This article describes a community support programme which implicitly challenges the assumption that the existence of a partner and local kin obviates the need to support women when they come home from hospital with a new baby. Implicit in the programme is the idea that support by mothers, of mothers, validates the activity of child care and is one way of facilitating the child's development. This programme was successful in terms of its perceived impact on both the providers and the recipients' ability to parent, in terms of providing training and support for providers, and in terms of strengthening links within the community and between the providers and the statutory and voluntary sectors. However, since the very model of care was a 'paid volunteering' one which perpetuated women's economic dependency it is a moot point whether it also perpetuated the devaluing of women's work. The subsequent mainstreaming of the programme and its inclusion of teenage lone mothers, who are likely to be co-parenting with their own mothers, raises still further questions about the complex and ambiguous nature of support for women. En este artículo se describe un programa de apoyo comunitario que, de manera implícita, pone en tela de juicio la creencia de que al tener una pareja o algun familiar muy cercano, las mujeres ya no necesitan ayuda cuando vuelven a casa después de tener un bebé. Implícita en el programa se encuentra la idea de que, el apoyo por parte de las madres de las madres da valor a la actividad del cuidado de niños y es a la vez una manera de facilitar el desarrollo de la niñez. Este programa tuvo mucho éxito en cuanto al impacto percibido tanto por aquellas que proporcionaban y recibían el apoyo de madres, en cuanto proporcionaban entrenamiento y apoyo para las proveedores debido al fortalecimiento de lazos con la comunidad, y entre las proveedoras y los sectores voluntarios y estatales. Sin embargo ya que este programa era un voluntariado pagado, el cual perpetúa la dependencia económica de la mujer, cabe preguntarse si también perpetúa la devalorización del trabajo de la mujer. La subsecuente parte principal del programa y la incorporación de madres adolescentes solas, quienes obtienen la ayuda de sus propias madres en el cuidado del bebé, provoca aun más interrogantes con respecto a la compleja y ambigua naturaleza de la ayuda a mujeres.     

Personal meaning in the public sphere: The standardisation and rationalisation of biodiversity data in the UK and the Netherlands

The demand for biodiversity data is increasing. Governments require standardised, objective data to underpin planning and conservation decisions. These data are produced by large numbers of (volunteer) natural historians and non-governmental organisations. This article analyses the interface between the state and the volunteer naturalists to understand the emerging patterns of information flow between them. Our results are based on research in the UK and the Netherlands. These two countries have a long history in volunteer biodiversity recording and are facing similar issues in relation to the increasing demand for standardised data. Our findings demonstrate that citizens who become involved in recording do so because they value nature and biodiversity. Recording is for them a way to enact their relationship with nature and contribute to its protection. Our findings also show that they are concerned about the increasing rationalisation in the process of data flow and about the way in which the government treats them and ‘their’ data. Our paper concludes by discussing this tension and the challenges and opportunities for biodiversity recording.     

Disability and social participation: The case of formal and informal volunteering

People with disabilities in the United States experience lower levels of social integration than people without disabilities. However, less is known about the association between disability and volunteer participation—despite an extensive literature on other disparities in volunteerism. This study uses data from the 2009–2015 Volunteer Supplement of the Current Population Survey to evaluate how working-aged adults with sensory disabilities, cognitive disabilities, physical disabilities, or multiple disabilities access, participate in, and maintain volunteer roles.Net of sociodemographic characteristics, adults with disabilities are no less likely than those without disabilities to report informal volunteering, although the presence of physical and multiple disabilities negatively associates with formal volunteering. Adults with disabilities report no fewer annual hours or weeks than those without disabilities if they are formal volunteers, but the mechanism through which they initially become involved in volunteer organizations varies. People with different types of disability experience different patterns of volunteering, and the sociodemographic characteristics associated with having a disability exacerbate many of these differences. Results suggest that adults with disabilities can—and do—participate in voluntary work, but may face barriers to accessing formal volunteer roles.     

The Value of the Relationship in Volunteer Home Support Programs Working with Vulnerable Families

This paper reports on a program evaluation project that included interviews with 35 parents from high-risk backgrounds who received home volunteer support as part of the Dalwood Volunteer Home Support Program. It provides insight into the meaning and value parents attach to the volunteer relationship. The evaluation findings suggest that home volunteer support was associated with parent perception of increased wellbeing, decreased social isolation, and an improved relationship with their child. The results also suggest that parents perceived their relationship with their volunteer as significant in providing a secure base relationship.     

大学生志愿服务活动开展机制研究

大学生志愿服务活动让大学生志愿者在奉献爱心服务社会中实现了自身的价值追求,对于社会主义核心价值体系和和谐社会建设也具有深远意义。然而志愿活动在主观认知、组织管理、制度保障等方面尚存不少问题,需要从参与、管理、保障三个方面对大学生志愿服务活动机制进行进一步的探索和完善。     

论兵团精神的时代价值——促进大学生西部支教事业的发展

以"热爱祖国、无私奉献、艰苦创业、开拓进取"为主要内容的兵团精神,激励着无数有志之士为边疆社会的发展贡献力量。大学生志愿服务西部计划,主要依托广大大学毕业生,为改善西部落后地区教育现状而开展的西部支援活动。这项活动与兵团建设有着共同的宗旨,二者的精神是一脉相承的,可以说支教精神是兵团精神的继承与发展。继承和弘扬兵团精神,对促进西部支教事业的发展,意义重大。     

On time and money donations

This paper investigates the importance of two forms of ‘impure’ altruism (“warm glow” and reputational concerns) as potential determinants of both time and money gifts. We first develop a comprehensive behavioral model which accounts for both types of donations, as well as for decisions about domestic and market hours of work. We then provide an empirical test of these drivers for giving using survey data for Italy. Results suggest that, according to the theoretical predictions, proxies for ‘impure’ altruism are important determinants of donations. Moreover, the unobservable determinants driving money and time donations are positively correlated, suggesting a certain degree of complementarity between the two decisions. Our findings also stress the importance of considering a behavioral model accounting for a full set of time and income uses to better characterize individual decisions to donate.