Motivations, Relationships, Health and Quality of Life of Older Volunteers in Times of COVID-19 Pandemic

Marco Socci, Andrea Principi, Mirko Di Rosa (), Sabrina Quattrini and Davide Lucantoni
Additional contact information
Marco Socci: Centre for Socio-Economic Research on Ageing, IRCCS INRCA—National Institute of Health and Science on Ageing, 60124 Ancona, Italy
Andrea Principi: Centre for Socio-Economic Research on Ageing, IRCCS INRCA—National Institute of Health and Science on Ageing, 60124 Ancona, Italy
Mirko Di Rosa: Centre for Biostatistics and Applied Geriatric Clinical Epidemiology, IRCCS INRCA—National Institute of Health and Science on Ageing, 60124 Ancona, Italy
Sabrina Quattrini: Centre for Socio-Economic Research on Ageing, IRCCS INRCA—National Institute of Health and Science on Ageing, 60124 Ancona, Italy
Davide Lucantoni: Centre for Socio-Economic Research on Ageing, IRCCS INRCA—National Institute of Health and Science on Ageing, 60124 Ancona, Italy

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 13, 1-19

Abstract: Within the active ageing framework, this study was carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic on older volunteers, in order to explore the possible relation between, on the one hand, changes in their health, social relationships and quality of life due to the pandemic and, on the other hand, volunteers’ motivations and (direct or indirect) experience of the COVID-19 contagion. Although various active-ageing-related issues have been studied during the pandemic, the studies did not cover the topic of the present study. Therefore, the results of this study advance the knowledge on the matter. A sample of 240 older volunteers was surveyed in Italy in July–August 2021. Bivariate analyses and multivariable logistic regression models were performed. The results highlighted that during the COVID-19 pandemic, for older people, volunteering in order to avoid thinking about personal problems was related to worsened health, while volunteering for social reasons was inversely related to a worsening quality of life. Having indirectly (by acquaintances) experienced the COVID-19 contagion was protective against the worsening physical health of older volunteers. The discussion includes the policy implications of the results.

Keywords: older volunteers; active ageing; Volunteer Functions Inventory; COVID-19 pandemic; health; quality of life; social relationships; Italy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/13/10739/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/13/10739/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:13:p:10739-:d:1189370

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().