Sundays, aliens and the Olympics are just three of the topics covered in research reports which have reached the BRIN in-tray over the last couple of days. Needless to say, they are not necessarily causally interconnected! Here are some of the findings relevant to BRIN readers:
Sundays
Sunday, the traditional day of rest and worship in Christianity, is considered the most boring day of the week by two-fifths of Britons. Three-quarters say that they often do not bother to leave their home on a Sunday, and 46% regularly go through the day without seeing or speaking to anyone (does that include live-at-home partners and children?) For 56% it is simply a lazy, ‘nothing’ day, with not even television a comfort: 57% claim there is never anything worth watching on the box. By late afternoon the ‘Sunday night feeling’ – the dread of the coming working week – is already bearing down on many people.
Source: Online survey of 2,000 adult Britons in June by OnePoll for Premier Inn. Summarized in the 72point blog of 6 July 2012 at:
http://digitalhub.72point.com/2012/07/sunday-blues/
Aliens
15% of Britons are convinced that ‘man has made contact with extra-terrestrial beings (aliens)’. Males (18%) believe this more than females (13%) and manual workers (17%) more than non-manuals (14%). In terms of age, belief is highest among those between 40 and 59 years (21%) and lowest for the 18-24s (9%). 66% deny that there has been any human contact with aliens, while 19% are uncertain. The question was posed as part of a survey into six ‘conspiracy theories’. Interaction with aliens was the third most prevalent theory, after belief that Princess Diana was assassinated (24%) and disbelief that Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President John F. Kennedy (17%).
Source: Online poll by YouGov among 1,752 Britons aged 18 and over on 19 and 20 June 2012. Data table available at:
Olympics
Although a minority (43%) of UK evangelical Christians are ordinarily interested in sport, with just 13% regularly participating in competitive sport, 79% feel that international sport is an excellent way of building friendships between nations, and 69% say they will be cheering on British competitors at the Olympic Games, which begin in London later this month. However, only 24% agree that the outlay of billions of pounds of public money on the Olympics has been well spent, and 30% consider that the Olympic movement is spoiled by competitors who cheat and take drugs.
Source: The World on Our Doorstep?, the latest report in the Evangelical Alliance’s 21st Century Evangelicals series, and also covering attitudes to immigration and diversity at home, to overseas mission and other Christian causes, and to general international and foreign policy issues. It derives from an online survey of 1,151 UK evangelicals who are members of the 21st Century Evangelicals research panel (‘an opportunity sample of self-selecting volunteers’) in February 2012. The report can be downloaded from:
http://eauk.org/church/resources/snapshot/upload/The-world-on-our-doorstep.pdf
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