Voluntary Service,Peer Group Orientation,and Civic Engagement

Abstract

Responses from students at two suburban Catholic high schools were analyzed to identify associations among peer group orientation, voluntary service, and civic engagement measures.Crowd types were constructed through cluster analysis of reputational group activities.Types were called School, Disengaged, All-Around, Fun, and Average.School crowd members were likely to volunteer for social service activities and unlikely not to volunteer; Fun crowd members showed the opposite tendency.All-Around crowd members were likely to choose functionary service compared with other crowds.Crowd membership was also differentiated on civic engagement measures.School crowd members were likely to participate in school clubs versus Fun members.School, All-Around, and Average crowd members had high scores on future service intentions, compared with Fun and Disengaged crowd members.School and Average crowd members scored high on intentions for political activities.These results support our theory of social-historical identity development.

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