For Immediate Release March 9, 2005

For More Information Contact: Marilyn Yurk, 317-261-3047 myurk@iupui.edu

Exemplary Volunteers Do Love Their Neighbors

INDIANAPOLIS - In a report released this month, Laura Littlepage, a research analyst at the IUPUI Center for Urban Policy and the Environment, led a group of researchers to evaluate the role of faith in motivating exemplary volunteers. Funded by a grant from the Indiana University Center on Philanthropy, the researchers studied the winners of national volunteer awards.

Littlepage explained that in the past, many studies have demonstrated a relation between religiosity and volunteering, but when you consider all of the studies in the academic literature, results are conflicting. Generally, researchers have examined either all people or only members of faith communities.

Some researchers have suggested that church members may have a higher rate of volunteering because of church-supported activities. For example, some churches expect members of their congregation to help other members. Other researchers argue that churches inspire a desire to help that moves people beyond the church setting.

Littlepage said, "Our study focused only on people who volunteer. We wanted to determine if award-winning volunteers are more likely to be religious than the general population. We also examined whether volunteers who are religious extend their volunteer efforts outside their church."

Littlepage said that on the whole, the religious affiliations of the exemplary volunteers were similar to distributions in the national population. However, only 8.6 percent of the exemplary volunteers performed volunteer work solely for religious organizations compared with a national average of 25 percent.

The research also yielded information about exemplary volunteers. They are more likely to be highly educated, retired and older than 60. Littlepage said that this is not surprising since award-winning volunteers generally have more experience with volunteer activities. They are also likely to have fewer family commitments and more time to volunteer. The researchers found that award winners report an average of 251 volunteer hours per year, almost twice the reported average for typical volunteers.

The study analyzed the motivations of the award winners and found that the three highest ranked motives were values (deeply held beliefs about the importance of helping others); social (volunteering because it is respected by relevant others); and a commitment to civic duty. While it is not unusual for people to work as volunteers in an effort to boost their own careers, this career motivation appears to be a weak motivator for exemplary volunteers.

Littlepage said that the research also revealed one motivation that is not widely discussed in the volunteer motivation literature - life changing events. These are dramatic events that lead people to volunteer their time to help others. About one-fourth of the award-winning volunteers interviewed mentioned such events. One was a mother who became active in victims rights and counseling after her three children were brutally murdered. Another was a father who began helping at-risk youth after losing his son in an automobile accident.

The exemplary volunteers in the study were people who had won one of two major awards sponsored by the Points of Light Foundation, a partner in the study. Some of them won the President's Service Award, the nation's highest honor for volunteerism. It recognizes individuals and groups who engage in community service that addresses unmet human service, educational, environmental, and public safety needs. Others won a Daily Point of Light Award, an award given to volunteers who find innovative ways to meet community needs, efforts that often lead to long-term solutions and impact social problems in local communities.

The Center for Urban Policy and the Environment is a nonpartisan applied research organization in the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). For additional information and the complete report, titled "Love thy Neighbor: the Role of Faith in Volunteer Motivation," contact the Center at (317) 261-3000, or visit the Center's Web site (http://www.urbancenter.iupui.edu/). ###