Development of a scale assessing retired older adults’ attitudes to volunteering
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This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Mitiku Dana, L, Jongenelis, MI, Jackson, B, Newton, RU, Pettigrew, S. Development of a scale assessing retired older adults’ attitudes to volunteering. Australas J Ageing. 2021; 40: e254– e261, which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1111/ajag.12907. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived Versions.
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Objective: Given positive attitudes to volunteering are likely to be associated with support for volunteering and individual participation, this study aimed to develop and test a 10-item ‘attitudes to formal volunteering’ scale for retired older adults that could be used to inform intervention efforts. Method: A sample of 801 Australian retirees (62% female; mean age: 71.9 years) completed a survey that included the attitude scale, demographic items and questions assessing engagement in volunteering. Results: A principal component analysis identified two factors (general attitude to volunteering and attitude to participating in volunteering) that together accounted for 64% of the variance in attitude scores. A confirmatory factor analysis indicated the two-factor model was an excellent fit to the data. Cronbach's alphas for both factors were >0.80, and both were positively associated with volunteering engagement. Conclusion: The proposed scale is a potentially useful instrument for measuring attitudes to volunteering among retired older adults.