4 Ways That Volunteering Can Be Good For You

More than 77 million Americans volunteer a total of 6.9 billion hours a year doing everything from fighting fires to raising funds for cancer research. These efforts help others and support communities. But volunteering also tends to benefit the volunteers themselves in at least four different ways, explains nonprofit management scholar Jennifer A. Jones.

1. Boosting your health, especially if you assist others

Volunteering has long been associated with good mental and physical health, particularly for older people. In a long-term study, researchers at the University of Wisconsin found that volunteering was linked to psychological well-being, and the volunteers themselves said it was good for their own health.

While anyone can benefit from volunteering, people who are the least connected to others tend to benefit the most. In fact, the benefits are so strong that researchers have suggested public health officials educate the public to consider volunteering as part of a healthy lifestyle.

One study in particular looked into which kind of volunteering may be best for your health. When a team of social scientists combed through data collected in Texas, they found that people who volunteered in ways that benefited others tended to get a bigger physical health boost than volunteers who were pitching in for their own sake. They also benefited in terms of their mental health, such as by experiencing fewer symptoms of depression and becoming more satisfied with their lives.

That is, serving meals at a soup kitchen might be better for your health than doing unpaid shifts as an usher in exchange for free theater tickets.

2. Making more connections

Volunteering, especially when it’s done on a regular basis, can help you make new acquaintances. Whether you volunteer for an organization on a daily, weekly or monthly basis, over time you are bound to develop strong relationships, typically with other volunteers and staff members.

Regular volunteers may get these benefits to a greater degree than people who volunteer sporadically, known as episodic volunteers. Consider this: Handing out water at a fundraising run in April and then helping bag groceries to give away in November is surely easier to squeeze into a busy schedule than volunteering regularly in an office. But those more convenient activities aren’t as likely to help you build relationships over time. In other words, consistency matters.

There are benefits and drawbacks to every type of volunteering. For example, volunteering once in a while is often easy to schedule and is something families or friends can do together. However, volunteers who pitch in occasionally may not feel very connected to the mission of the nonprofits they support or get to know many other volunteers.

Regularly volunteering...

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