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Motivation in older adult volunteerism
Abstract
What motivates older adults (i.e., people 60 years of age or older) to take part in volunteer activities is the question of concern in this study. The literature review revealed few studies on this subject. Altruism, sociability, and enjoyment of the volunteer experience were the most common reasons for volunteering given by older people. Two areas of weakness were found in these studies. First, an inappropriate statistic was used to determine motivation--i.e., percentages. A higher statistic, such as factor analysis, is needed when considering causation. Secondly, the samples in the empirical studies were generally small, local, and non-randomly selected. The availability of the 1991 Marriott Seniors Volunteerism Study for secondary analysis provided an opportunity to consider the question of motivation with a large (N = 962), national, random sample. It was noted that the top three categories of Maslow's hierarchy of needs (i.e., belonging and love, esteem, and self-actualization) seemed similar to the most commonly stated reasons for older adult volunteerism. It was hypothesized that a factor analysis of the reasons given in the Marriott data would produce a scale similar to Maslow's, with altruism and sociability as primary. Such a result would be considered an indication that Maslow's theory provides some help in explaining older adult volunteerism. Factor analysis was applied to the question associated with reasons for volunteering in the Marriott study. Three factors were revealed: anomia (33% of variance), sociability (13.1%), and altruism (11.3%). The Cronbach alpha of reliability was.7556. The Pearson correlation revealed that single older people volunteered for both anomic (r =.1965; p $<$.01) and altruistic (r =.1129; p $<$.05) reasons. Unemployed people volunteered for anomic reasons (r =.1239; p $<$.05). Older seniors volunteered for anomic reasons (r =.1370; p $<$.01). Single older people volunteered for both anomic (r =.1216; p $<$.05) and altruistic (r =.0954; p $<$.05) reasons. Maslow's theory, as a help in understanding older adult volunteerism, was not supported by the analysis of the Marriott data. Two possible ways of interpreting anomia as a motivation for older adult volunteerism are as a time when one is easily influenced, or as a coping strategy.
Subject Area
Gerontology
Recommended Citation
Hughes, James Paul, "Motivation in older adult volunteerism" (1992). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9233401.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9233401