Individual and Social Factors in Volunteering Participation Rates in Europe

The main goal of this article is to explore the role of individual sociodemographic characteristics and national social backgrounds in forming people's decisions to engage in voluntary work. We have drawn data from the European Value Survey (1990, 1999, and 2008). We analyze voluntary work as an aggregate measure and also through four different categories. We have performed multilevel regression models taking into account a hierarchical structure of two levels: individual and country. There are no relevant gender and age differences, and, in fact, the most important differences lie in the impact of social factors rather than individual characteristics. We also highlight that geographical effects are diluted after controlling for social factors, but a certain level of geographical variance remains unclarified by the explanatory variables. This conclusion has important policy implications because it opens the door to implementing social policies that could be effective for all European countries.