Chapter 4: College Students’ Preferred Approaches To Community Service: Charity and Social Change Paradigms

Morton’s (1995) model of paradigms of service was used to assess student preferences for community service activities. Reliable assessment of student preferences for the Charity and Social Change paradigms was shown. College students, especially women and younger students, showed strong preferences for service activities typical of the Charity orientation. Students with service experience during high school were more likely to endorse Social Change. Both orientations predicted plans for future community involvement. Implications for the structuring of service activities in service-learning and for future research are discussed.