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Religious Involvement and Participation in Volunteering: Types, Domains and Aggregate

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Abstract

Prior research on investigating the religion–volunteering relationship has tended to commonly treat religious involvement as single-item measures, e.g., frequency of church attendance, and has defined volunteering as a simple dummy variable (1 = volunteers, 0 = otherwise). The present study attempted to look at the above relationship by measuring religious involvement as a multifaceted and multi-item measure and volunteering as engaging in different types of voluntary activity, and specific domains and overall aggregate of volunteering. The results based on a statewide representative sample from the Survey of Texas Adults 2004 showed that religious involvement was generally and significantly related to higher volunteering across voluntary types, domains, and aggregate count of volunteering, but varied in magnitude contingent on the types and domains being examined. In addition, the religious effects were held even adjusting for a variety of pertinent socio-demographic and denominational characteristics, in which these background characteristics are more dynamic in relation to volunteering than we knew. Implications of the findings related to social services and policy making are discussed.

Résumé

À ce jour, les recherches portant sur la relation entre la religion et le bénévolat traitaient généralement l’implication religieuse comme mesure à article unique, p. ex. la présence à l’église, et définissaient le bénévolat en tant que variable nominale (1 = bénévoles, 0 = autrement). La présente étude tente d’aborder la relation mentionnée précédemment en évaluant l’implication religieuse comme une mesure à facette et à article multiples et le bénévolat sous forme d’engagement dans divers types d’activités connexes, dans des domaines précis et sous tous ses aspects globaux. Les résultats, basés sur un échantillon représentatif de l’État tiré du Survey of Texas Adults 2004 (sondage des adultes du Texas), démontrent que l’implication religieuse était en général grandement associée à un bénévolat plus important pour tous les types, domaines et aspects groupés du bénévolat, mais qu’elle variait en magnitude selon les types et les domaines étudiés. En outre, les incidences religieuses semblaient s’ajuster à une gamme de caractéristiques sociodémographiques et confessionnelles pertinentes, où ces caractéristiques fondamentales sont plus dynamiques comparativement au bénévolat que nous connaissions. Les implications des résultats dans le contexte des services sociaux et de l’élaboration des politiques font l’objet d’une discussion.

Zusammenfassung

Frühere Studien zur Untersuchung der Beziehung zwischen Religion und ehrenamtlicher Tätigkeit neigten dazu, das religiöse Engagement gewöhnlich in Single-Item-Messungen zu erfassen, z. B. die Häufigkeit von Kirchenbesuchen, und die ehrenamtliche Tätigkeit als eine einfache Dummy-Variable zu definieren (1 = ehrenamtlich tätige Personen, 0 = Sonstige). In der vorliegenden Studie untersuchte man die oben genannte Beziehung, indem man das religiöse Engagement mittels einer vielfältigen Multi-Item-Messung und die ehrenamtliche Tätigkeit als Beteiligung an verschiedenen Arten ehrenamtlicher Aktivitäten bewertete, und betrachtete spezifische Bereiche sowie die Gesamtheit der ehrenamtlichen Tätigkeiten. Die Ergebnisse beruhend auf einer staatsweiten representativen Stichprobe aus der 2004 durchgeführten Befragung von Erwachsenen in Texas zeigten, dass eine generelle und bedeutende Verbindung zwischen dem religiösen Engagement und einer vermehrten ehrenamtlichen Tätigkeit in allen Arten ehrenamtlicher Aktivitäten, ehrenamtlichen Bereichen und der Gesamtzahl der ehrenamtlichen Tätigkeiten besteht, wobei jedoch das Ausmaß in Abhängigkeit von den untersuchten Arten und Bereichen unterschiedlich ausfiel. Darüber hinaus wurden die religiösen Effekte aufrechterhalten und passten sich sogar an eine Vielzahl entsprechender sozio-demographischer und konfessioneller Merkmale an, wobei diese Hintergrundmerkmale in Verbindung mit der ehrenamtlichen Tätigkeit dynamischer sind als uns bekannt war. Es werden die Implikationen dieser Ergebnisse in Bezug auf soziale Dienstleistungen und politische Entscheidungen diskutiert.

Resumen

Investigaciones previas sobre la relación religión-voluntariado han tendido a tratar normalmente la implicación religiosa como mediciones de un solo elemento, p.ej.: la frecuencia de la asistencia a la iglesia, y a definir el voluntariado como una simple variable simulada (1 = voluntarios, 0 = lo contrario). El presente estudio trató de analizar la relación anterior midiendo la implicación religiosa como una medición de múltiples elementos y múltiples facetas y el voluntariado como la implicación en diferentes tipos de actividad voluntaria, y campos específicos y el agregado global del voluntariado. Los resultados basados en una muestra representativa de todo el Estado de la Encuesta de Adultos de Texas de 2004 mostró que la implicación religiosa estaba relacionada generalmente y de manera significativa con un mayor nivel de voluntariado en todos los tipos de voluntarios, campos y recuento agregado del voluntariado, pero variaba en magnitud dependiendo de los tipos y campos que se examinaron. Asimismo, se mantuvieron los efectos religiosos incluso ajustándose para una variedad de características sociodemográficas y denominacionales pertinentes, en las que estas características de fondo son más dinámicas en relación con el voluntariado de lo que sabíamos. Se tratan las implicaciones de los hallazgos relacionados con los servicios sociales y la formulación de políticas.

要約

之前针对宗教 — 志愿活动关系的研究趋向于将宗教参与作为单一事项措施来对待,例如,出席教堂的频率,并将志愿活动定义为简单的虚拟变量(1 = 志愿者,0 = 其他)。本研究试图通过将宗教参与作为一个多层面和多事项措施来衡量,将志愿活动作为各种志愿活动不同类型的参与以及志愿活动的特定领域和整体集合来衡量,以此来考虑上述关系。根据来自德州 2004 年成人调查在全州范围内的代表样本,结果显示在所有的志愿活动类型、领域和志愿活动合计总数方面,宗教参与普遍、显著与更多的志愿活动相关,但是在被检差的类型和领域反面存在量级偶然事件的差异。此外,即使对大量相关社会人口统计学特征和教派特征进行调整,宗教影响仍然存在,在这种情况下背景特征与志愿活动所具有的动态相关性,比我们所知更密切。对社会服务和政策制定的相关影响和发现做了讨论。

ملخص

إتجهت الأبحاث السابقة إلى التحقيق في علاقة التطوع الديني عادة لعلاج المشاركة الدينية كقياس لعنصر واحد، على سبيل المثال، تكرارحضور الكنيسة، وتعريف العمل التطوعي كمتغير وهمي بسيط (1 = المتطوعين، 0 = غير ذلك). حاولت هذه الدراسة الحديثة النظر في العلاقة المذكورة أعلاه عن طريق قياس المشاركة الدينية كإجراء متعدد الأوجه ومتعدد البنود والتطوع كالإنخراط في مختلف أنواع النشاط التطوعي، ومجالات محددة ومجموع كلي للعمل التطوعي. أظهرت النتائج إستنادا” إلى عينة نموذجية على مستوى الولاية من إستطلاع الرأي لكبار تكساس عام 2004 أن المشاركة الدينية كانت مرتبطة بشكل عام وبشكل كبير إلى ارتفاع التطوع عبر أنواع التطوع، المجالات، والعد الكلي للعمل التطوعي، لكن إختلفت في حجم الوحدة في الأنواع والمجالات التي تم بحثها. بالإضافة إلى ذلك، عقدت الآثار الدينية تعديل متساوي لمجموعة متنوعة من الخصائص الإجتماعية والديموجرافية والطائفية ذات الصلة، التي فيهاهذه الخصائص الخلفية أكثر ديناميكية فيما يتعلق بالتطوع مما كنا نعرفه. تمت مناقشة الآثار المترتبة على النتائج المتعلقة بالخدمات الإجتماعية وأخذ السياسات.

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Notes

  1. The authors’ classification of secular volunteering participation is trickier, because the eight so-called “voluntary organizations or groups” are not voluntary: recreational groups, organizations active in political issues, youth-oriented groups, and organizations providing cultural services to the public. Membership in these groups does not necessarily mean the participants were volunteers; they could be service recipients only.

  2. The formula provided in Clogg et al. (1995) is \( {\text{Z}} = \frac{b1 - b2}{{\sqrt {{\text{SEb}}_{{1^{2} }} + {\text{SEb}}_{{2^{2} }} } }} \), in which b1 and b2 are regression betas and \( {\text{SEb}}_{{1^{2} }} \) and \( {\text{SEb}}_{{2^{2} }} \) are the coefficient variances.

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Yeung, J.W.K. Religious Involvement and Participation in Volunteering: Types, Domains and Aggregate. Voluntas 28, 110–138 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11266-016-9756-6

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