The Cultivation of a Prosocial Value Orientation Through Community Service: An Examination of Organizational Context, Social Facilitation, and Duration

Community service is widely regarded as a fundamental experience in preparation for good citizenship, but it remains unclear
whether common variants of service are consequential for civic outcomes. This study examines changes in the relative importance
assigned to prosocial and egoistic values associated with service through different types of organizations, service prompted
by external contingencies, and service that spans a narrow or wide frame of time. Data were drawn from the survey responses
of 16,749 secondary school students (50 percent female, 28 percent ethnic minority, modal age = 15) who participated in the
National Educational Longitudinal Study during their sophomore year in 1990 and completed a follow-up survey during their
senior year in 1992. Results from a propensity score analysis indicated that service through humanitarian organizations but
not other types of organizations was positively associated with the adoption of a prosocial value orientation. Service prompted
by an institutional mandate or social pressure was negatively associated with prosociality relative to service characterized
as strictly voluntary, although all students except those with an initially egoistic value orientation benefited from mandatory
service relative to no service. While short-term service during the sophomore year had no enduring effect, long-term service
predicted gains in prosociality above and beyond the effect of concurrent service. The findings suggest that the relationship
between community service and prosocial value development can be optimized to the extent that service through a humanitarian
organization is prompted by autonomy-supportive conditions over the course of 2 years.