Effectiveness of Crisis Center Volunteers and the Personal Orientation Inventory

Abstract

43 university students who had volunteered for crisis center work were initially evaluated for positive characteristics via the Personal Orientation Inventory, then later rated on semantic differential scales for effectiveness as volunteers. Among the rating scales were those purported to measure empathy, nonpossessive warmth, and genuineness. In the present study, positive characteristics as inventoried yielded more negative significant than positive correlations with supervisors' ratings of effectiveness. All were small to moderate in magnitude. Strong, active, energetic, self-directed, and genuine gave the largest negative rs with inventory scales. This study does not confirm earlier findings with somewhat similar samples and procedures. The Personal Orientation Inventory might be measuring positive characteristics of the more tender-minded, while supervisors of crisis workers were favoring the strong, active, and genuine.