The functions and norms that drive university student volunteering

Abstract

Young adult volunteers are vital to the current and future operations of nonprofit organizations yet many countries report low and declining volunteer participation by this group. Moreover, university students are a particularly under-utilized and underresearched segment of potential young adult volunteers. As such, the current study examines the functions and norms that drive university students to volunteer. A survey of 282 students indicates that the Volunteer Functions Inventory (VFI) does not adequately explain the volunteering of today's university students. For instance, t-tests reveal that the importance of the VFI functions among current students differs significantly to the importance of the functions among the previous generation of students. Also, factor analysis shows that the structure of the VFI model is unstable for the current sample while multiple regression reveals that the VFI explains only 11% of university student volunteering. In contrast, x 2 -tests indicate that volunteering by university students is dependent on the observed volunteering of primary reference group members (i.e., parents, siblings, close friends). The results suggest that nonprofit organizations may need to revise their recruitment strategies for today's university students: rather than appealing to the functional benefits of volunteering, positioning volunteering as the 'normal' thing to do may be more successful. Further research is needed to develop a richer understanding of reference group influences on the volunteering behavior of today's young adults.

Successful partnerships with third sector organisations to enhance the healthcare student experience: A partnership evaluation

“…University students are a key component of the volunteering workforce that is, to date, a particularly under-utilized and under-researched segment of potential young adult volunteers (Francis 2011). A national survey in 2013 found that 44% of adults volunteered formally at least once a year with 29% volunteering once a month.…”

Photovoice as a Pedagogical Tool: Examining the Parallel Learning Processes of College Students and Preschool Children through Service Learning

“…As described earlier, the measure employed for the college student participants was the Voluntary Functions Inventory (VFI), which is often cited as the most prominent in the study of attitudes for motivation in the literature (Clary et al, 1998;Vocino & Polonsky, 2011;Francis, 2011). The VFI protocol consists of 30 items that identify six types of functional motives: values, social, career, understanding, enhancement and protective (Vocino & Polonsky, 2011).…”

“…The VFI protocol consists of 30 items that identify six types of functional motives: values, social, career, understanding, enhancement and protective (Vocino & Polonsky, 2011). According to Francis (2011), over 200 journal articles cite Clary and colleagues' (1998) model for capturing the motivations of those that volunteer. While the VFI provides a solid marker for measuring the motivations of our sample of college students, the addition of photovoice was used to capture additional findings that may not be possible through survey methods.…”

Why mentor? A validation study of the volunteer functions inventory for use in youth mentoring

“…For example, studies have applied the VFI to volunteerism in youth sports (Kim, Zhang, & Connaughton, 2010) and environmental conservation (Wright, Underhill, Keene, & Knight, 2015). Others have validated the instrument for use among particular demographic groups, including American (Francis, 2011), Chinese (Wu, Lo, & Liu, 2009), and Australian university students (Hyde & Knowles, 2013), as well as for older adults (Okun & Schultz, 2003; Okun, Barr, & Herzog, 1998) and retirees (Brayley et al, 2014). Similar to Clary et al (1998) other validation researchers have found issues with individual items and the overall factor structure of the VFI.…”