Who are they and why do they do it? The habitus of sport event volunteers in Norway: volunteers at the European handball championship for women 2010

Abstract

In this article, we scrutinize socio-demographic characteristics and motivation among volunteers at the 2010 European handball championship for women (Euro 2010). Bourdieu's notion of habitus is used as the analytical framework. Surveys were sent to volunteers before Euro 2010 (n = 186, response rate = 65%) and after (n = 231, response rate = 58%). Results show that volunteers had a middle-class background and were equally distributed between genders. Most of the volunteers (81%) had experience as volunteers at major sport and other events, and 60% had experience from handball events. The motivation for volunteering was related to (1) competence development (which may also be utilized later in life), (2) the event experience itself and (3) the continuation of a social tradition. The identification of a handball/sport event volunteer habitus (based on both objective biographical information and more subjective motivational factors) might help event organizers to target specific groups when recruiting volunteers.