Investigating mechanisms for recruiting and retaining volunteers: The role of habit strength and planning in volunteering engagement

ABSTRACT

Volunteering rates in high-income countries are declining. Most research into understanding volunteering engagement has focused on conscious processes (e.g., motives), with little exploration of non-conscious antecedents of volunteering engagement. Adopting a new line of investigation, this research used temporal self-regulation theory to investigate the influence of both rational and automatic processes on volunteering engagement. Two related studies using different methodologies were conducted to investigate the influence of intention, planning, and habit strength on volunteering engagement. In both studies, intention and habit strength were significant predictors of volunteering engagement, with planning only significantly predicting volunteering engagement in Study 1. It was also found, in Study 2, that habit strength moderated the intention–behavior relationship. These findings highlight that both rational and automatic processes play a part in volunteering engagement and have implications for recruiting and retaining volunteers.

KEYWORDS:

• Volunteering
• temporal self-regulation theory
• intention
• habit strength
• planning

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data described in this article are openly available in the Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/yxk3b/.

Open scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badge for Open Materials. The materials are openly accessible at https://osf.io/yxk3b/.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the HACC (Home and Community Care) Growth funding in 2016/17 (HACC Non-Recurrent Funding), Department of Health, Government of Western Australia.

Notes on contributors

Barbara Mullan

Barbara Mullan is a Professor and Deputy Head of School within the Health Psychology and Behavioural Medicine Research Group, in the School of Psychology at Curtin University (@mullanbarbara).

Caitlin Liddelow

Caitlin Liddelow is a psychology PhD student within the Health Psychology and Behavioural Medicine Research Group, in the School of Psychology at Curtin University, and a research assistant in the School of Occupational Therapy, Social Work and Speech Pathology (@caitlinliddelow).

Jessica Charlesworth

Jessica Charlesworth is a psychology PhD student within the Health Psychology and Behavioural Medicine Research Group, in the School of Psychology at Curtin University, and a research assistant in both the School of Psychology and the School of Occupational Therapy, Social Work and Speech Pathology at Curtin University (@jpcharlesworth).

Ashley Slabbert

Ashley Slabbert is a psychology PhD student and research assistant within the Health Psychology and Behavioural Medicine Research Group, in the School of Psychology at Curtin University.

Vanessa Allom

Vanessa Allom is a research fellow within the Health Psychology and Behavioural Medicine Research Group, in the School of Psychology at Curtin University.

Courtenay Harris

Courtenay Harris is the Deputy Head of School of Occupational Therapy, Social Work and Speech Pathology at Curtin University and is involved in both teaching and research within the school.

Anne Same

Anne Same is a project officer and research assistant within the School of Occupational Therapy, Social Work and Speech Pathology at Curtin University.

Emily Kothe

Emily Kothe is a lecturer in Psychology within the School of Psychology at Deakin University. She is also the research synthesis stream leader in the data sciences unit in the School of Psychology at Deakin University.