Social environment: volunteering

People's willingness to volunteer (an indicator of 'social participation') is a frequently used proxy measure of so-called 'social capital'. Chart 1 shows, by council area of residence, the percentage of adults who were recorded as having provided unpaid help to an organisation or group in the 12 months prior to being surveyed in the 2018 Scottish Household Survey. Overall 26% respondents said they had done so, but as is clear from the chart, there is considerable variation across the different council areas, with the figures ranging from around 12% in West Dunbartonshire to 47% in Shetland.

The national figure has changed little in recent years, ranging between 26% and 28% since 2013.

Note that levels of volunteering can vary considerably according to age, gender and, especially, social class: the figures reported here do not take these factors into account.

Please note: If you require the most up-to-date data available, please check the data sources directly as new data may have been published since these data pages were last updated. Although we endeavour to ensure that the data pages are kept up-to-date, there may be a time lag between new data being published and the relevant ScotPHO web pages being updated.