A new data set is now available online in the Qualiservice catalog at https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.967581.

It consists of eleven transcripts of qualitative group discussions from the study funded by the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ) on the Federal Government's Fourth Civic Engagement Report (https://www.vierter-engagementbericht.de/), which was conducted by Andreas Kewes and Benjamin Haas at the University of Siegen from April to December 2023.

The project examines access opportunities to volunteering as well as obstacles or thresholds that exist for certain population groups according to gender, age, income, educational and migration background and that can favor or hinder the exercise of voluntary activities. Accordingly, the qualitative study examines the question of which conditions, prerequisites and measures can increase the access opportunities and possibilities of volunteering for the above-mentioned groups and which obstacles they encounter. To answer these questions, eleven group discussions were conducted with a total of 41 participants who have experience in various volunteer activities. The respective groups were selected and compiled according to one category of social inequality. The inequality categories of migration, gender, class, urban-rural and disability were taken into account; a regionally diverse distribution was also ensured. The discussions focused on the framework conditions for starting and continuing volunteering, problems that arise and possible solutions, as well as suggestions for facilitating and improving access opportunities.

The anonymized transcripts of these eleven group discussions are now available as a scientific use file for secondary scientific use. The data set has a wide range of potential uses, as it is suitable, for example, for secondary analyses of sociogenetic type formation, mechanisms of reproduction of social inequality, engagement-related motivations, reflections and collective patterns of interpretation as well as the significance of informal networks.