Developing an Instrument of Sustainability in Environmental Volunteering Participation (I-SEVP) Among Youth

Abstract

Identifying the factors that contribute to participation in environmental volunteering will guide successful interventions as well as contribute to environmental conservation and human well-being. However, the issues of dropout in environmental volunteering creates a sense of urgency to identify factors contributing to sustained voluntary service through inventory. Thus, this study aimed to develop an instrument of sustainability in environmental volunteering participation (I-SEVP). The process of the instrument development involved four stages; i. interviewing youth volunteer to identify the factors contributing to participation in environmental volunteering, ii. Developing instrument based on identified themes, iii. Conducting a pilot test, and iv. Performing exploratory factors analysis (EFA), construct reliability as well as interpretation of total score means. In this study, a total of the 77-item questionnaire was administered to 267 youth (15-30 years of age).  EFA analysis was run according to four main factors, namely environmental volunteering values, social norms, volunteers’ well-beings and intention to predict sustainability in environmental volunteering participation. The results showed that the three sub-constructs were grouped under environmental volunteering values; personal needs (egoistic), contribution to society (altruistic) and role awareness (altruistic and biospheric).  Social norms consisted of social influences, fulfil the university or employers’ needs and influences of cultures while the volunteers’ well-beings consisted of four sub-constructs, i.e. positive emotion, relationship, achievement and spiritual. It is expected that this instrument would be helpful in research and evaluation that is aimed at measuring factors affects the sustainability in environmental volunteering participation among youth.