Department of Psychology, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, RI, USA.
Am J Health Promot. 2022 Jan;36(1):64-72. doi: 10.1177/08901171211034742. Epub 2021 Jul 23.
Engaging in community service, or unpaid work intended to help people in a community, is generally associated with greater overall well-being. However, the process of beginning and maintaining community service engagement has been sparsely examined. The current study applied the Transtheoretical Model (TTM) of behavior change to understanding community service readiness among young adults.
Cross-sectional design using an online survey.
Participants were undergraduate students recruited at a mid-sized Northeastern US university in Spring 2018.
Participants ( = 314) had a mean age of 20.36 years ( = 3.69), were primarily White (78%), female (72%), and from moderately high socioeconomic backgrounds (as measured by parental level of education).
Socio-demographics including age, gender, race-ethnicity, and parental level of education; readiness, pros, cons, and self-efficacy for community service; civic engagement behavior; well-being.
Participants were classified into very low ( = 62), low ( = 59), moderate ( = 92), high ( = 46), and very high ( = 55) readiness for community service groupings. A MANOVA was conducted to assess relationships between groupings and community service TTM constructs, civic engagement, and well-being.
There were significant differences between readiness groupings on all main outcome variables, (20, 1012) = 10.34, < .001; Wilks' Λ = 0.54, η = .14. Post-hoc Games-Howell tests showed that those exhibiting higher levels of readiness reported fewer cons, greater pros, higher self-efficacy, more overall civic engagement, and greater well-being compared to lower readiness individuals.
Consistent with previous TTM applications, self-efficacy and the importance of pros increased across readiness groupings while the importance of cons decreased. Study findings may be used to inform readiness-tailored interventional work for increasing community service. This area of study would benefit from longitudinal research examining community service readiness beyond the college environment.
参与社区服务，即旨在帮助社区居民的无偿工作，通常与整体幸福感的提升有关。然而，人们对开始和维持社区服务参与的过程的研究还很少。本研究应用行为改变跨理论模型（TTM）来理解年轻人参与社区服务的准备情况。
采用横断面设计，使用在线调查。
2018 年春季，参与者是在一所美国东北部中等规模大学招募的本科生。
参与者（n=314）的平均年龄为 20.36 岁（SD=3.69），主要为白人（78%），女性（72%），来自中高社会经济背景（以父母的教育程度衡量）。
包括年龄、性别、种族-民族和父母的教育程度等社会人口统计学特征；社区服务的准备情况、利弊和自我效能感；公民参与行为；幸福感。
参与者被分为社区服务准备情况极低（n=62）、低（n=59）、中（n=92）、高（n=46）和极高（n=55）五个组别。进行了 MANOVA 分析以评估组别的社区服务 TTM 结构、公民参与和幸福感之间的关系。
在准备情况组别之间，所有主要结果变量均存在显著差异，（20，1012）=10.34， <.001；Wilks' Λ=0.54，η=0.14。事后 Games-Howell 检验显示，与准备情况较低的组别相比，表现出较高准备情况的组别报告的顾虑较少，优势较多，自我效能感较高，总体公民参与度较高，幸福感较强。
与之前的 TTM 应用一致，自我效能感和优势的重要性随着准备情况的增加而增加，而顾虑的重要性则减少。研究结果可用于为增加社区服务提供基于准备情况的干预工作。这一研究领域可以从考察社区服务准备情况在大学环境之外的纵向研究中受益。
