About The Authors

July 2022 - Voluntary

Trust in charities fell at the beginning of 2022, reaching lowest level since 2019: A study looking at public opinions around charity and giving has uncovered that in February 2022 trust in charities dropped to its lowest level since 2019. This follows a steady level of trust in 2021.

The Charities Aid Foundation's Just Giving 2022 survey is conducted online and collects responses from around 1,000 people every month. The latest survey also looked at more recent polling in 2022 when all Covid-19 restrictions came to an end.

The survey found that in 2021, trust in charities remained pretty stable and higher than levels before the Covid-19 pandemic, peaking at 60% of respondents having trust in charities in January 2021. For the final few months of 2021 trust levels were around 54%.

However, the research also revealed that trust levels may be returning to their historical average. The dip of six percentage points seen between January and Febuary 2022 (from 54% to 48%) was to the lowest trust level recorded since October 2019. In March, trust levels had a boost back up to 54%, before dipping again to 50% in April 2022, just before the report was published.

Delving a little deeper into the findings, the research found that men (51%) are less likely to trust charities than women (58%), however age does not seem to cause much differentiation in the data. 

Looking at the social grading of respondents against the responses they gave, greater differences can be found. For example, those from higher social grades tend to have more trust in charities, according to the poll, with 60% of ABC1 respondents saying they 'agree' or 'strongly agree' that charities are trustworthy, compared to 48% of C2DE participants.

During the first lockdown in 2020, trust in charities stabilised at around 55%, found the research.

Charitable contributions

In 2020 and 2021, there was a slight decrease in the number of people who had contributed to a charitable cause, whether that be through volunteering or donations.

One in five of those surveyed said they had bought an item from a charity shop between January and April 2022, with a third saying they had donated their clothes or goods.

On the other hand, just 2% said they had volunteered at a charity shop at the beginning of 2022, with 16-34-year-olds most likely to volunteer than any other age group. It was also uncovered that full-time students and those who work less than eight hours per week are more likely to volunteer and help a charity.

Other Voluntary Research Findings

Other Latest Market Research Insights