Egoistic Motives and Longevity of Participation by Social Service Volunteers

This study tests the hypothesis that in a setting in which service volunteers are likely to experience meager egoistic benefits their longevity of participation is inversely related to the extent to which they feel motivated to volunteer by the need for—or expectation of—egoistic benefits. We confirmed this hypothesis in a multiple-regression analysis based on the case records of all volunteers who terminated their participation during a nine-month period in a Big Brothers/Big Sisters program.