Why People Volunteer: Self-Interest Behind Altruism

Introduction

The question of why people volunteer to help others is difficult to answer succinctly, because doing so demands consideration of a number of relatively disparate fields of study, including everything from evolutionary psychology to management theory. However, one can at least begin to formulate a general explanation of volunteerism that holds regardless of the particular individual, organization, or task by examining previous research on volunteerism alongside information regarding a widely known contemporary volunteer organization: Teach for America. By considering general investigations into volunteerism alongside specific accounts from Teach for America volunteers, one is able to appreciate how the drive to volunteer stems not from altruism, but rather from self-interest coded as altruism — because the particular self-interested behavior produces benefits for others as well as for the volunteer.

Ultimately, this study demonstrates that volunteerism is rooted in self-interest, as evidenced by experimental data, by the actions of Teach for America as an organization, and by the self-reports of individual members. Although this does not fully explain why volunteerism is held in such high regard, it does demonstrate that volunteering and ostensibly altruistic actions are not as difficult to explain as one might think.

Research and Methodology

Because this study seeks to develop an explanation for volunteerism that functions both generally and specifically, the research was conducted with attention to both levels of analysis. The first step required selecting a specific volunteer organization to use as a case study, in order to test the validity of general insights gleaned from previous research on volunteerism. The organization chosen was Teach for America, a program in which recent college graduates volunteer to teach for two years in schools across the United States, typically in low-income areas. Teach for America was selected as the object of study for several important reasons.

First, Teach for America is one of the most popular volunteer organizations in the country, having had over 33,000 volunteers since its establishment in 1990 (Teach for America 2012). Second, it has served as a cornerstone of recent policy efforts to promote greater volunteerism, making an examination of the motivations behind participation potentially illuminating with respect to the political dimensions of volunteerism (Lahann & Reagan 2011, p. 7). Finally, Teach for America has had a somewhat problematic track record, which opens up a productive discussion about the value of volunteerism and those cases in which volunteering benefits the volunteer more than the person ostensibly receiving aid (Lahann & Reagan 2011; Fogarty 2011). There is also evidence suggesting that participation in Teach for America actually lowers the likelihood that someone will volunteer in the future, raising further interesting questions about volunteerism as a social process (McAdam & Brandt 2009).

Having selected the specific organization, the next step required searching peer-reviewed journals for existing research on the reasons for volunteerism more broadly. As philanthropy in the form of volunteerism has become a more frequent topic of discussion over the last twenty years — evidenced by Teach for America's growth and by increased policy attention to service — the motivations behind volunteerism have been studied from a variety of perspectives. Two especially relevant investigations came from the journals Chemical Engineering Progress and Administrative Science Quarterly, demonstrating that the topic of volunteerism extends well beyond the usual domains of sociology or psychology.

The methodological approach of this study was twofold. On one hand, it examined general reasons why individuals might volunteer by reviewing experimental findings and theoretical insights into human behavior and decision-making. On the other hand, it consulted firsthand accounts from individuals who volunteered for Teach for America. While these accounts did not constitute the entirety of the evidence — first-person reports must be treated with some degree of reservation — they nevertheless contributed meaningfully to this study's understanding of volunteerism. Finally, the results from both approaches were combined in order to compare reported motivations for volunteering with the experimental and theoretical data.

Literature Review

Perhaps the most immediately striking theme in the literature about Teach for America was how problematic the organization appeared to a number of researchers. Teach for America portrays itself as an unequivocally beneficent organization, and although it has undoubtedly accomplished good, this portrayal is deeply incongruous with the picture presented by researchers examining its actual effect on the communities it assists. As will be seen, this incongruity seems to extend to volunteerism itself: when individuals state their reasons for volunteering, they tend to downplay the personal benefits while emphasizing the assistance they are ostensibly providing. Examining some of the issues researchers have identified with Teach for America is therefore helpful in determining why people volunteer in the first place, because these issues highlight underdiscussed motivations that influence the decision to volunteer.

Perhaps the most striking finding is that Teach for America appears to be failing, at least partially, in achieving its central goal of providing underfunded and disadvantaged schools with quality teachers. As Fogarty notes, one of the appeals of the organization is the idea that it functions "as a way of enticing some of America's top students into teaching," but testing has shown that "the students of novice TFA teachers perform significantly less well in reading and mathematics than those of credentialed beginning teachers" (Fogarty 2011, p. 7). This is a significant condemnation of Teach for America's efforts, particularly given that the organization presents itself as a primary remedy for America's education challenges. In reality, the best Teach for America can say about itself seems to be that its teachers perform better than substitutes, but not as well as regular, credentialed teachers (Fogarty 2011, p. 7).

Furthermore, the organization appears to be failing in its secondary goal of shaping "individuals who will care about education in their future jobs on Wall Street, in Washington or elsewhere outside the classroom" (Fogarty 2011, p. 7). A separate study examining survey results from Teach for America volunteers found that while volunteers scored higher "on a broad range of attitudinal items measuring civic commitment," this did not translate into action: volunteers who completed their two years of teaching were actually less likely to vote than drop-outs or non-matriculated applicants, and were also less likely to engage in future service or volunteer work (McAdam & Brandt 2009, pp. 945, 963). Moreover, those volunteers who did continue service work after their teaching placement overwhelmingly remained within the Teach for America organization itself, suggesting that the net result of participation is either to discourage future volunteer work or to channel it in ways that benefit the organization more than the broader public (McAdam & Brandt 2009, p. 965).

A further study revealed a troubling dimension of Teach for America that concerns not its educational performance, but rather the implicit political ideology it appears to promote while presenting itself as an apolitical project. Specifically, Teach for America's "explicit use of the language of business and appropriation of corporate culture in its pursuit of more equitable public education" has aligned it with explicitly neoliberal policy goals (Lahann & Mitescu 2011, p. 8). Although the authors argue that Teach for America represents a form of "progressive" neoliberalism, the discourse and culture it perpetuates appear designed to encourage and sustain precisely those political positions inclined to support organizations like itself. While organizations naturally tend to promote movements that support their goals, this pattern once again suggests that Teach for America's primary interest lies in perpetuating its own success as an institution rather than improving the American education system.

Taken together, this literature suggests that Teach for America is considerably more self-interested than it leads the public to believe. This insight leads naturally into the broader literature on volunteerism. One article consulted does not investigate volunteerism experimentally, but instead examines a number of possible reasons individuals might volunteer. The author identifies four: "networking," "skills development," "fun," and "giving back." Notably, only the last is altruistic; the first three are explicitly self-interested benefits for the volunteer (Kent 1997, p. 12). Even in describing "giving back," the author begins by noting that "volunteer work feels good," demonstrating that even the most seemingly altruistic reason retains a self-interested dimension (Kent 1997, p. 12). Although this article does not offer a particularly deep analysis of volunteerism, it hints at an uncomfortable reality: for all practical purposes, there may be no such thing as pure altruism, since any act can ultimately be traced back to some form of self-interest, even when the perceived reward is less tangible than the sacrifice required.

A second article provides a more rigorous investigation by examining the results of experiments designed to identify individuals' reasons for volunteering. Using participants' education level, group size, and the degree of payoff for both volunteers and non-volunteers as variables, the researchers found that volunteerism consistently increased when the payoff for the volunteer increased, and decreased as the overall group size grew larger (Murnighan, Kim, & Metzger 1993, p. 533). Despite its complexity, the study points to a straightforward conclusion: the central motivation behind volunteering is self-interest, and the principal difference between volunteer actions and overtly self-interested ones is that the former produces at least some noticeable benefit for others.

Conclusion

By comparing experimental results with the self-reports of Teach for America volunteers, this study has demonstrated that volunteerism is, in essence, self-interest operating under the guise of altruism. Volunteers opt to help others because they perceive some benefit for themselves, and although this benefit is rarely monetary, it is no less important as a motivator. This leads to the conclusion that altruism as it is commonly conceived may not exist in any meaningful sense, because for virtually any altruistic act one can imagine — including volunteering — there is at least some benefit for the individual that makes it worthwhile.

References

Fogarty, M. 2011, "Teach for America fails the test," Education, pp. 7.

Katz, S.J. 2007, "Teach for America, Hope for the Future," Bioscience, vol. 57, no. 9, pp. 735.

Kent, K.J. 1997, "So why should anyone get involved with volunteer organizations?," Chemical Engineering Progress, pp. 12.

Lahann, R. & Reagan, E.M. 2011, "Teach for America and the Politics of Progressive Neoliberalism," Teacher Education Quarterly, vol. 38, no. 1, pp. 7–27.

McAdam, D. & Brandt, C. 2009, "Assessing the Effects of Voluntary Youth Service: The Case of Teach for America," Social Forces, vol. 88, no. 2, pp. 945–969.

Murnighan, J.K., Kim, J.W. & Metzger, A.R. 1993, "The volunteer dilemma," Administrative Science Quarterly, vol. 38, no. 4, pp. 515–536.

Ness, M. 2005, Lessons to Learn: Voices from the Front Lines of Teach for America, Routledge, New York.

Teach for America 2012, Teach for America. Available from: http://www.teachforamerica.org [Accessed: May 29, 2012].