Ilona Kupčikienė, Eglė Stasiūnaitienė, Sandra Palažijūtė

Abstract

Volunteering complements a professional support and is one of the major activities in the field of social work. Every future social worker evaluates and understands volunteering based on the number of attitudes that may have an impact on professional work and assistance, so it is important to find out their prevailing attitudes. Attitudes to volunteering in Lithuania and Finland are a relatively new research area. Aim of the work: to explore the attitudes of future social workers toward volunteering in Lithuania and Finland. Research methods: A descriptive quantitative study based on the cognitive, emotional and behavioral components of the attitude. 40 students of social work study program from Kaunas College (Lithuania) and 40 students from Tampere College (Finland) were interviewed. Research question: What are the attitudes of future social workers toward volunteering in Lithuania and Finland? Work object: Attitudes of future social workers toward volunteering in Lithuania and in Finland. Research outcomes: According to the survey data analysis, a cognitive component of the respondents’ attitudes towards volunteering is similarly expressed in both countries. All of the respondents know what volunteering is and positively evaluate the benefits to a future social worker and the public. Examination of the behavioral component of the respondents’ attitudes towards volunteering showed that one-third of respondents in Lithuania and two-thirds of the respondents in Finland have volunteering experience. All the respondents in Finland and half of the respondents in Lithuania do not participate in volunteering due to the lack of time; one-third of respondents in Lithuania do not participate due to the lack of information. Examination of the emotional component of respondents’ attitudes showed that volunteering is associated with positive feelings in both countries, and most of all with a sense of selfsacrifice, which was pointed out by one-third of the respondents in Finland, and about half of the respondents in Lithuania. Half of the respondents in both countries said that their attitudes to volunteering have changed over the years of study.

Keyword(s): volunteering; attitude; social worker.
DOI: 10.5200/sm-hs.2015.106
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