Volunteers play a central role in contemporary society, yet the value created through their contributions remains fragmented across academic literatures. Drawing on a systematic literature review of 146 academic articles, this study provides a comprehensive overview of volunteer value. It addresses the proliferation of terms used to describe value, changes in the volunteering landscape, and the expanding range of value recipients. The review conceptualizes volunteer value distribution across three analytical levels—micro, meso, and macro—and identifies a broad set of value types and recipients. In doing so, it advances research on volunteer value creation and distribution. This article calls for greater inclusion of the nonprofit sector in volunteer value research, increased attention to uneven value distribution among recipients, and further investigation into how volunteer value equity can be promoted.
Philine S. M. van Overbeeke (Fri,) studied this question.