The National SOM Survey 1996

Since 1986 the research project ´Samhälle Opinion Massmedia´ (SOM) has been carrying out an annual nation-wide survey of Swedish opinions. This is accordingly the eleventh survey in this series. The questionnaire was divided into six subject fields: mass media; politics and society; Sweden´s relations to the rest of the world; energy, nuclear power and environment; leisure; and background. Most of the questions are replications of questions asked in one or several previous SOM-surveys. New media questions dealt with how often the respondent read local advertisement papers as well as daily papers on the internet. The respondent also had to state if a number of statements corresponded with qualities held by the morning and evening papers the respondent used to read, and to indicate if criticism directed towards daily papers could be applied on papers read by the respondent. Respondents were also asked about their opinion on the function of democracy in Sweden, attitudes towards proposals how to reduce unemployment, and to give their opinion on the possibility to reduce unemployment by 50 percent until year 2000. Furthermore the respondents had to rank the most important and second most important goals for Sweden to work towards during the coming ten years. Respondents were also asked if they could consider to undertake political assignments for the political party they sympathize with. Other questions dealt with qualities possessed by three different political parties and their party leaders as well as by three different mass media; attitudes towards referendum held in certain issues as well as general attitudes toward referenda; and different group´s influence on programs supplied by the non commercial television channels as well as the commercial channel TV4. Respondents had to state if they believed one in general can trust most people, they also had to tell how satisfied they were with their own life, and to tell their knowledge of foreign languages. Purpose: The main purpose of the surveys is to establish time series that enable researchers to analyse how various changes in society affect people's attitudes and behaviour.