RESEARCH TITLE
Perceptions of the EU and Russia in Serbian Public (Public Opinion in Serbia 2018 – JMS 2018)
RESEARCH FIELD
Political and social attitudes
RESEARCH SUBJECT
The project was dedicated to the attitudes of Serbian citizens concerning Serbian international politics, and especially to the relationship between Serbia and Russia, or the EU.
PROBLEM
Majority of the earlier, similarly themed research projects concerned primarily attitudes towards the EU, and only rarely attitudes towards Russia. Positions towards the EU are usually researched by asking the respondents in what way they would vote in case the EU accession referendum was the following week. The data concerning the contents of the citizens’ attitudes in this sphere are sparse, particularly when it comes to the motives behind such attitudes, as well as mutual connections between such attitudes and opinions. As it has already been said, particularly lacking are the data concerning the attitudes towards Russia and opinions on the way in which the position and politics of Serbia are related to the politics and interests of the EU and Russia.
The goal of the research was for the collected data to enable to move a step farther than merely describing the attitudes and perceptions of Serbian citizens. Therefore the questionnaire also included the variables that might help in causal modelling of the citizens’ attitudes and orientations. In addition to the series of socio-demographic variables, the questionnaire also included socio-psychological variables (authoritarianism), party preferences, as well as the measures of wider ideological orientations (positioning on the Left-Right scale and dimensions of pro-Russian, and opposed to anti-Russian orientation).
RESEARCH
The survey was realised in October and November 2018. The questionnaires were filled in by the respondents on their own, via computer, smartphone, or other internet access device. The questionnaire was prepared in the LimeSurvey open-source platform, so it was in fact an online survey.
This was a special-purpose sample, since choosing of the respondents was not based on the probabilistic selection. The sample included 3,271 respondents. The sample included a higher percentage of the citizens whose education level was higher than in the average sample and more citizens living in urban areas.
RESULT
Database JMS 2018.
The publications so far containing the data collected in this research. These data have been used in the analyses the results of which have in turn been presented in scientific conferences and in publications.
