Development of a scale assessing retired older adults’ attitudes to volunteering

Objective Given positive attitudes to volunteering are likely to be associated with support for volunteering and individual participation, this study aimed to develop and test a 10‐item ‘attitudes to formal volunteering’ scale for retired older adults that could be used to inform intervention efforts. Method A sample of 801 Australian retirees (62% female; mean age: 71.9 years) completed a survey that included the attitude scale, demographic items and questions assessing engagement in volunteering. Results A principal component analysis identified two factors (general attitude to volunteering and attitude to participating in volunteering) that together accounted for 64% of the variance in attitude scores. A confirmatory factor analysis indicated the two‐factor model was an excellent fit to the data. Cronbach's alphas for both factors were >0.80, and both were positively associated with volunteering engagement. Conclusion The proposed scale is a potentially useful instrument for measuring attitudes to volunteering among retired older adults.