We Stand As One: Motivators for Involvement in the Respect Movement

The Respect Movement is the effort to reduce the number of sexual assaults at Arizona State University by the organizations Man Up and WOW Factor (Women of Worth). One of the movement's goals is to grow its membership. The aim of this thesis is to understand the members' motivations to ensure that the movement's communication responds to these motivators and to add to the scholarly investigation of volunteer motivation and communication. This research will analyze what motivates people to be involved with social change organizations. Once those motivators are discovered, the Respect Movement can start incorporating them into their communication to draw more people to the movement and to continue engaging their current members. Scholarly literature reveals that people are more motivated to participate in something if they are recognized and if they feel important and valuable to the organization. A survey was used in this study to gather responses to the following questions: 1) Are members currently motivated to attend Respect Movement functions? 2) What type of communication are they currently responding to; 3) What types of people and students are being engaged by the movement and with whom could they do a better job of connecting? 4) What motivates members when they are working toward a goal? 5) How well is the Respect Movement currently motivating its members? Overall, the findings from the survey show that the Respect Movement is effectively motivating students to be involved with the organization. The main recommendations from the survey results are: 1) increase attendance at events by making them special or meaningful to the attendees and creating a positive experience; 2) help the members find practical ways to achieve the goal of reducing the number of sexual assaults on campus by building a culture of respect as a habit in their lives; 3) make members feel appreciated by asking their advice. The respondents noted this was very important to them; 4) continue to develop the values of community, integrity, compassion and justice within the organization. Future research could include additional study of the movement's members through other research approaches such as interviews or conducting a similar survey with members from other types of community organizations.