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A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts

BACKGROUND: Episodic volunteers are a critical resource for public health non-profit activities but are poorly understood. A systematic review was conducted to describe the empirical evidence about episodic volunteering (EV) in the public health sector and more broadly. Study location, focus and tem...

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Autores principales: Hyde, Melissa K, Dunn, Jeff, Scuffham, Paul A, Chambers, Suzanne K
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4192798/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25248403
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-14-992
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author Hyde, Melissa K
Dunn, Jeff
Scuffham, Paul A
Chambers, Suzanne K
author_facet Hyde, Melissa K
Dunn, Jeff
Scuffham, Paul A
Chambers, Suzanne K
author_sort Hyde, Melissa K
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Episodic volunteers are a critical resource for public health non-profit activities but are poorly understood. A systematic review was conducted to describe the empirical evidence about episodic volunteering (EV) in the public health sector and more broadly. Study location, focus and temporal trends of EV research were also examined. METHODS: Twelve key bibliographic databases (1990-April week 2, 2014) were searched, including Google Scholar. Empirical studies published in English in peer-reviewed journals that identified participants as EVs who volunteered to support Not-for-Profit organisations in the health and social welfare sectors were included. EV definitions, characteristics, economic costs, antecedents and outcomes and theoretical approaches were examined. RESULTS: 41 articles met initial review criteria and 20 were specific to the health or social welfare sectors. EV definitions were based on one or more of three dimensions of duration, frequency, and task. EVs were predominantly female, middle aged, Caucasian (North American) and college/university educated. Fundraising was the most common EV activity and 72% had volunteered at least once. No studies examined the economic costs of EV. There was little consistency in EV antecedents and outcomes, except motives which primarily related to helping others, forming social connections, and self-psychological or physical enhancement. Most studies were atheoretical. Three authors proposed new theoretical frameworks. CONCLUSIONS: Research is required to underpin the development of an agreed consensus definition of EV. Moreover, an EV evidence-base including salient theories and measures is needed to develop EV engagement and retention strategies for the health and social welfare sectors.
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spelling pubmed-41927982014-10-11 A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts Hyde, Melissa K Dunn, Jeff Scuffham, Paul A Chambers, Suzanne K BMC Public Health Research Article BACKGROUND: Episodic volunteers are a critical resource for public health non-profit activities but are poorly understood. A systematic review was conducted to describe the empirical evidence about episodic volunteering (EV) in the public health sector and more broadly. Study location, focus and temporal trends of EV research were also examined. METHODS: Twelve key bibliographic databases (1990-April week 2, 2014) were searched, including Google Scholar. Empirical studies published in English in peer-reviewed journals that identified participants as EVs who volunteered to support Not-for-Profit organisations in the health and social welfare sectors were included. EV definitions, characteristics, economic costs, antecedents and outcomes and theoretical approaches were examined. RESULTS: 41 articles met initial review criteria and 20 were specific to the health or social welfare sectors. EV definitions were based on one or more of three dimensions of duration, frequency, and task. EVs were predominantly female, middle aged, Caucasian (North American) and college/university educated. Fundraising was the most common EV activity and 72% had volunteered at least once. No studies examined the economic costs of EV. There was little consistency in EV antecedents and outcomes, except motives which primarily related to helping others, forming social connections, and self-psychological or physical enhancement. Most studies were atheoretical. Three authors proposed new theoretical frameworks. CONCLUSIONS: Research is required to underpin the development of an agreed consensus definition of EV. Moreover, an EV evidence-base including salient theories and measures is needed to develop EV engagement and retention strategies for the health and social welfare sectors. BioMed Central 2014-09-24 /pmc/articles/PMC4192798/ /pubmed/25248403 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-14-992 Text en © Hyde et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2014 This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Research Article
Hyde, Melissa K
Dunn, Jeff
Scuffham, Paul A
Chambers, Suzanne K
A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
title A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
title_full A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
title_fullStr A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
title_full_unstemmed A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
title_short A systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
title_sort systematic review of episodic volunteering in public health and other contexts
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4192798/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25248403
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-14-992
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