Event

British Social Attitudes: Public Attitudes in an Era of Crisis

Annual British Social Attitudes survey.

Event date:

22nd September 2022 10:00 GMT Standard Time
Format:

online

The National Centre for Social Research is Britain’s largest independent social research organisation. On 22 September, NatCen published findings from its annual British Social Attitudes survey.

Since 1983 we've been measuring and tracking changes in people's social, political and moral attitudes, to understand what it’s like to live in Britain what the public thinks about how Britain is run.

At this year's event we explored liberalism in today’s society and the emergence of the woke agenda. This year’s report also examines the public’s satisfaction with the NHS, attitudes towards disability in the workplace and whether climate change has become our main environmental concern.

At this webinar, we also discussed inequality, looking at trends over time and across regions. What does the North/South divide look like, or is it London vs. the rest and how do our regional differences affect our social values?

Copies of the speaker presentations can be found below. The webinar was chaired by Gillian Prior, Deputy Chief Executive at NatCen, and speakers included:

Professor Sir John Curtice, Senior Research Fellow, NatCen

Broken Britain? Social and Economic Attitudes in an Era of Crisis (pdf)

Alex Scholes, Senior Researcher, ScotCen

Constitutional reform: findings from the British Social Attitudes survey (pdf)

Sarah Butt, Research Director, NatCen

Regional differences in values in England: findings from British Social Attitudes survey (pdf)

At this year's launch event we were also joined by Andrew Harrop, General Secretary at the Fabian Society, and Charlotte Pickles, Director at Reform, who responded to the British Social Attitudes’ latest findings and shared their comments.

Speakers

Sir John Curtice

Senior Research Fellow National Centre for Social Research

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Sir John Curtice is Senior Research Fellow at NatCen, Professor of Politics at Strathclyde University, and Chief Commentator on the What UK Thinks: EU and What Scotland Thinks websites.
He has been a regular contributor to the annual British Social Attitudes report since 1986 and an editor since 1994. He has also been a Co-Director of the Scottish Social Attitudes survey since its foundation in 1999, and his analyses of Scottish public opinion in the run up to the independence referendum were frequently featured throughout the campaigns.
In 2018, he received a knighthood in the New Year's Honours list. Sir John is a regular media commentator on both British and Scottish politics.
Alex Scholes

Senior Researcher National Centre for Social Research

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Alex joined ScotCen as a Researcher following the completion of his Masters in September 2018. Since then he has been involved in a variety of projects utilising a wide range of different research methodologies across a range of policy areas. Projects he is currently working on include the ESRC funded ‘What UK Thinks: EU’ and ‘What Scotland Thinks’ websites, the Scottish Social Attitudes Survey (SSA) and evaluations of the Distress Brief Interventions Programme.
Sarah Butt

Research Director National Centre for Social Research

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She is currently the lead researcher on several complex surveys, both face to face and mixed-mode, being carried out for clients including the Department for Education and Department for Work and Pensions.

Prior to rejoining NatCen in 2019, Sarah was a Deputy Director of the European Social Survey and Senior Research Fellow at City, University of London. She has also been a social researcher at the Department for Education where she worked on the evaluation of the National Citizen Service and provided analytical support for the department’s work on teenage pregnancy.

Her research interests are wide-ranging and cover both methodological (survey non-response, interviewer behaviour, social measurement) and substantive (political knowledge and engagement, attitudes to democracy) topics.