Scottish Household Survey 2022: Key Findings

8. Volunteering

The 2022 SHS asked respondents about any formal volunteering (giving unpaid help to organisations or groups) that they had undertaken during the previous 12 months. It also asked respondents about informal volunteering (giving unpaid help directly – not via an organisation or group – to other people or places, not including help given to relatives). Questions on informal volunteering are asked every two years in the SHS. Due to the methodological changes implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic, the last comparable dataset for the questions on informal volunteering is for 2018.

Volunteering rates

In the last year, 46% of respondents had taken part in volunteering of any kind (formal or informal) (Table 8.52). 22% of respondents said they had undertaken formal volunteering (Table 8.1), which includes the sum of respondents who reported that they had undertaken ‘only formal volunteering’ or had undertaken ‘both formal and informal volunteering. 36% said they had undertaken informal volunteering, which includes respondents who reported that they had undertaken ‘only informal volunteering’ or had undertaken ‘both formal and informal volunteering’ (Table 8.52). Of these, 12% said they had undertaken both formal and informal volunteering (Table 8.52).

The percentage of respondents who said that they had undertaken formal volunteering had dropped since 2019, when 26% of respondents said they had done so (Table 8.1). The longer-term picture also shows a decline: since 2011, the rate of formal volunteering has dropped by 9 percentage points (from 30% in 2011 to 22% in 2022) (Table 8.1).

For informal volunteering, the last year for which comparable data are available is 2018, when 22% of respondents said they did informal volunteering only and 14% said they did both formal and informal volunteering (Table 8.52).

As such, the data suggest that while informal volunteering remains at levels consistent with rates before the COVID-19 pandemic, participation in formal volunteering has reduced. While these data do not provide insights into the reasons for the drop in formal volunteering between 2019 and 2022, it is likely that this is partly explained by residual or longer-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on formal volunteering participation.

Reasons for volunteering

79% of respondents who said they had not done any formal volunteering in the past 12 months said that nothing would encourage them to do this in the future (Table 8.42). For those who identified any reasons that would encourage them to volunteer, the most common reasons given were if they knew how their time and skills could help others (8%); and availability of information on roles and how to get started (6%) (Table 8.42).

Respondents aged 16 to 34 were more likely to identify something that would encourage them to volunteer than respondents who were 60 or over (27% of respondents aged 16 to 34 identified at least one factor compared with 10% of respondents aged 60 and above) (Table 8.42).

Volunteering and sex

Men and women were equally likely to undertake formal volunteering in the past year (Table 8.3). However, women were more likely than men to say they had done informal volunteering (38% compared with 34%) as well as any type of volunteering (47% compared to 44%) (Table 8.54).

Types of volunteering

We asked respondents about the types of volunteering they had undertaken.

The most common type of formal volunteering was with organisations working on ‘local community and neighbourhood’ issues (27% of respondents who had undertaken formal volunteering). This is an increase from 2019 when 22% of respondents did this. In 2022, ‘Youth or children's activities outside school’ was the second most popular type of volunteering (21%) (Table 8.12).

Similar percentages of respondents said they had volunteered for organisations working on ‘Health, disability and wellbeing’ (15%), ‘Hobbies and recreation’ (15%), and ‘Physical activity, sport and exercise’ (15%). The proportion of respondents who said they volunteered with ‘children’s education and schools’ had dropped from 19% in 2019 to 14% in 2022 (Table 8.12).

Women were more likely than men to volunteer with organisations supporting ‘children’s education and schools’ (18% compared with 9%). On the other hand, men were more likely than women to volunteer with organisations involved in ‘Physical activity, sport and exercise’ (21% compared with 9%) and ‘Hobbies and recreation’ (19% compared with 11%) (Table 8.14).

The most common informal volunteering activity was ‘keeping in touch with someone who is at risk of being lonely’ – 60% of respondents who said they had done informal volunteering had done this. This was followed by ‘Doing shopping, collecting pension, collecting benefits or paying bills’ (42%); and ‘Routine household chores e.g. cooking, cleaning, laundry, gardening’ (28%). Women were more likely than men to provide many types of informal volunteering support, although men were more likely to help with ‘Car or home maintenance or repairs’ and ‘Helping someone else to improve a skill’ (Table 8.64).

Volunteering and age

Overall, respondents aged 35 to 59 were the most likely to say they had undertaken any kind of volunteering during 2022. Roughly half of respondents (49%) in this age group had volunteered, compared with 43% of respondents aged 16 to 34 and 44% of respondents aged 60 or over (Table 8.53).

Respondents aged 35 to 59 were the most likely to have volunteered only informally and both formally and informally (39%) in 2022.

The formal volunteering rate was similar between age groups, with roughly 1 in 5 respondents of all age groups saying they had volunteered in the last 12 months (Table 8.2). The types of volunteering that different age groups undertook varied more widely, however. For example, younger volunteers (aged 16 to 34 and 35 to 59) were more likely than older volunteers (aged 60 or over) to support organisations working with children’s education and schools, youth or children’s activities outside school, or engaging in physical activities, sport and exercise. Respondents aged 60 or over were more likely than younger volunteers to be working with organisations involved in ‘Religion and belief’ (Table 8.13).

Income, deprivation and volunteering

People living in higher-income households and less deprived areas (as defined by the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation – SIMD) were more likely to volunteer than those from lower-income households and more deprived areas. 52% of respondents living in households with a net annual income of over £30,000 had done some type of volunteering (formal or informal) in the previous 12 months, compared with 34% of people from households earning up to £15,000 (Table 8.62).

Similarly, 51% of respondents living in the 20% least deprived areas had volunteered either formally or informally, compared with 37% of those living in the 20% most deprived areas (Table 8.58).

The difference between people living in the most and least deprived areas was larger for rates of formal volunteering than for informal volunteering. 27% of respondents living in the least deprived areas said they had done formal volunteering, compared with 14% of respondents in the most deprived areas. For informal volunteering the rates were 37% and 31% respectively (Table 8.58).

Rural/urban location and volunteering

Volunteering is more common in rural areas. 51% of respondents living in rural areas said they had done either formal or informal volunteering in 2022, compared with 44% of those living in more urban areas (Table 8.60). Volunteers living in rural areas were more likely to volunteer for local community or neighbourhood organisations/groups (34%) than people in the rest of Scotland (25%) (Table 8.20). People living in remote small towns were the most likely to engage in any type of volunteering (Table 8.61).

Volunteering and disability

Disabled respondents (defined as a limiting long-term physical or mental-health condition) were less likely to say they had undertaken any type of volunteering (formal or informal) in the past 12 months than those with no disability (43% compared with 46%). Non-disabled respondents were more likely than disabled respondents to volunteer formally, however both participated in informal volunteering more than in formal volunteering (Table 8.57). Disabled people who had done formal volunteering were more likely to volunteer with organisations working on health, disability and wellbeing as well as hobbies and recreation than non-disabled people (21% compared with 13% for both) (Table 8.17).

Volunteering and ethnicity

‘White: Scottish’ adults were more likely to have done any type of volunteering in comparison to minority ethnic adults (by a difference of 13 percentage points) (Table 8.56). There was a larger gap between groups in relation to informal volunteering, with a difference of 17 percentage points (38% of respondents identifying as ‘White: Other British’ had volunteered informally volunteering compared with 20% of people from minority ethnic groups (Table 8.56).

All ethnic groups were active in organisations focussed on the local community and neighbourhood. Additionally, minority ethnic respondents were the mostly likely of all ethnicities to volunteer in organisations focussed on religion and belief (Table 8.16). Keeping in touch with someone who is at risk of being lonely was the most common type of informal volunteering for all ethnic groups (Table 8.66).