The Emotions of Volunteering: The Volunteer Self in Relation to Employment

• In Event: 606 - Section on Social Psychology Roundtable Session (co-sponsored with Section on Sociology of Emotions)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 05. Self and Identity

Abstract

The Emotions of Volunteering: The Volunteer Self in Relation to Employment
This study seeks to better understand what sustains and disrupts the commitment of volunteers by examining the identity and emotion dynamics experienced by direct service volunteers who work to help other people without renumeration. Drawing on analysis of thirty-two in-depth interviews with volunteers and volunteer coordinators, this study examines how volunteers engage in identity work in relation to their paid employment. For volunteers with successful careers in which they enjoy/ed autonomy and meaningful senses of self, volunteering is a the icing on the cake: an opportunity to enhance their feelings of importance by doing impactful work without pay. For volunteers without paid employment as an avenue for securing meaningful senses of self, volunteering is a path for enhancing and even supplementing work skills and the identities that come along with paid employment. How the relationship between volunteerism and paid employment is the basis for the emotional experiences that disrupt volunteerism.

Author

• Carissa M. Froyum, University of Northern Iowa