Volunteer numbers fell dramatically with the onset of COVID-19. Two thirds of volunteers stopped their activity from February 2020 and for them, the wellbeing declines and worsening in mental health have been large.
One a scale of 0-10 for life satisfaction, volunteers had a higher score at 7.1 than non-volunteers who scored 6.9.
Volunteers who didn’t give up their activity during COVID-19 had a smaller drop in life satisfaction than those who did give up or those who didn’t volunteer at all.
Around 7% of those who continued volunteering had a probability of serious mental illness compared with 10% of those who stopped volunteering.
19% of those who stopped volunteering said they felt lonely at least occasionally compared to 16% of those who didn’t stop.
Prior to COVID-19, volunteers have higher levels of life satisfaction than those who don't volunteer. During January 2020 as the pandemic became apparently, life satisfaction for both groups fell. The the decline for those who continued to volunteer instead of choosing to give up that activity were smaller.
On a 0-10 scale, life satisfaction fell by 0.31. There were very large and very similar falls for those who chose to give up their volunteering activity ( 0.45 fall) and those who didn't volunteer at all (0.47 decline). The effect was the same as if income had dropped by $216.00 a week. It seems being able to keep volunteering appears to be a very important protective factor.
Volunteering also appears to reduce the likelihood of experience higher levels of psychological distress.
This distress is measured on the Kessler-6 (K6) measure. It can be constructive as a continuous measure ranging from 6 to 30, where those respondents with a score of 19 or higher are said to have a probably serious mental illness.
The average K6 score for those who stopped volunteering was 11.9 in April 2020. It was slightly less than the score of 12.1 for those who never volunteered.
But the score for those who continued to volunteer was, at 11.1, significantly and substantially lower than that for those who stopped volunteering or those who never started.
18.6 per cent of those who stopped volunteering reported they felt lonely occasionally, a moderate amount or most of the time. The number was slightly lower at 15.5 per cent for those who kept volunteering. This is some evidence that stopping volunteering may have led to increased isolation and a lack of social interaction.