Volunteering among Chinese College Students during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Volunteering has been found to be not only beneficial to the well-being of recipients but also to the volunteers themselves, particularly from the life course perspective. Although previous studies have identified key factors of volunteering motivation, the literature is less focused on the interplay of public interest and private gains in volunteering motivation. This study used 1871 college students across China to examine how the interplay between public interest and private gains affects general and Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)-specific volunteering during the pandemic. The results show that the interplay of these two factors constitutes a dynamic process, depending on the volunteering and time-specific context. Overall, undergraduate students with greater concern for public interest and less preference in private gains had the highest rate of overall volunteering, followed by students with high concern for both public interest and private gains. It is crucial to take both public interest and private gains into account when discussing volunteering opportunities among Chinese college students, which may increase the well-being of students in the long run.