Eurobarometer 63.1: Science and Technology, Social Values, and Services of General Interest, January-February 2005 : Version 1

• Main Author: Papacostas, Antonis
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: ICPSR - Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research 2006
• Subjects: Norway; Iceland
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.3886/icpsr04563.v1; http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/ICPSR/studies/4563/version/1

This round of Eurobarometer surveys diverged from the standard Eurobarometer measures and queried respondents on their opinions regarding science and technology, social values, and services of general interest. Questions concerning the first topic focused on the respondents' attitudes toward science and technology issues including what areas they were most interested, how informed respondents were in general, and recent visits to a museum of science and technology or another type of public museum. Other questions measured respondents' level of trust in science, their views on the role science and technology should have in improving the economy, the potential benefits or harmful effects of science, and the role the European Community plays in scientific research. Another topic covered was social values in relation to science and technology. Respondents were asked how often they thought about the meaning and purpose of life, about their spiritual beliefs, what kind of family they grew up in, how often they trusted other people, how satisfied they were with their lives, whether a university education is more important for a man than for a woman, and whether men make better political leaders than women. The surveys also solicited respondents' opinions with respect to developing technologies (including solar energy, biotechnology, genetic engineering, the Internet, nanotechnology), and possible applications of science and technology over the next 20 years (such as cloning monkeys or pigs for use in research into human diseases or cloning human beings so that couples can have a baby even when one partner has a genetic disease). Respondents were queried on their opinions about humanity's relationship to nature, what decisions about science and technology should be based primarily on, how important they thought science and technology would be for their society in ten years' time, and if what those who are involved in science and technology do has a positive effect on society. Finally, the topic of services of general interest (such as electricity, natural gas, fixed telephone, mobile phone, postal services, local transport, rail transport, and air transport) included questions regarding satisfaction with the provision of services, accessibility, fairness in pricing, quality of service, and customer service. Background information collected includes respondent age, gender, nationality, marital status, left-right political self-placement, occupation, age at completion of education, household composition, telephone equipment, religion, and region of residence. : Please review the ICPSR Weighting Information provided in the codebook for information regarding weights available with Eurobarometer 63.1. : Datasets: DS1: Dataset : Eurobarometer Survey Series : face-to-face interview (1) The documentation (codebook and SAS, SPSS and Stata setup files) for this collection contain characters with diacritical marks used in many European languages. (2) The categories and scales for variables P6 (Size of Community) and P7 (Region) may have changed compared to former Eurobarometers up to Eurobarometer 61. (3) The variable P6UK (Size of Locality United Kingdom) integrates data for Northern Ireland (codes 1-2) and Great Britain (codes 3-5). (4) The fieldwork dates in the data file for Austria, Portugal, Spain, and Norway are not consistent with the fieldwork dates in the Technical Specifications. (5) The total number of interviews is 31,390. The table in the Technical Specifications shows the total number of interviews as 32,897. (6) Values in the data and setup files may vary from those shown in the questionnaire due to standardization of response categories. (7) A split ballot was used for this survey. The variable SPLIT (v787) defines the separate groups. : Citizens of the EU aged 15 and over residing in the 25 EU member countries: Austria, Belgium, Republic of Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, plus the citizens of the four EU candidate countries: Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, Turkey, as well as the citizens in three EFTA (European Free Trade Association) countries: Iceland, Norway, and Switzerland. Smallest Geographic Unit: country : Multistage national probability samples.