Conference Agenda

Aim: This study aims to analyse life satisfaction inequalities across native and immigrant groups in Europe and the role of discrimination in explaining these inequalities.

Methodology

This study employs a descriptive intersectional approach. It used pooled data from seven waves of the European Social Survey (ESS, 2002-2018). It uses representative cross-sectional samples of all persons aged 15 and over (no upper age limit) residents in European countries. Individuals were aged between 18 and 65. Natives - individuals born in the country- and immigrants from low and middle-income countries were included.

Variables

The outcome variable was life satisfaction. It was measured through the question ‘All things considered, how satisfied are you with your life nowadays?’ on an 11-point scale (0 being ‘extremely dissatisfied’ and 10’ extremely satisfied’). The response was dichotomised into low LS (score 0-4) and high LS (score 5-10).

Independent variables included gender, ethnic minority status, and immigrant status—household income feeling, dichotomised into comfortable living and financial difficulty. Age and survey year were adjusting variables. A multi-categorical variable with 16 strata was created, with highly educated majority ethnic group men as the reference group.

Statistical analysis

The statistical analysis in the study involved a series of logistic regression models to assess poor self-reported health (PSRH) using an analysis of individual heterogeneity and discriminatory accuracy (AIHDA) approach. Initially, Model 0 incorporated age and survey year. Subsequent models incrementally added gender, ethnic minority background, immigrant status, and household income feelings. Internal validation was performed using Bootstrap with 1000 repetitions. The Discriminatory Accuracy (DA) was assessed using the area under the receiver operator characteristic curve (AUC-ROC), with values ranging from 0.5 (no discrimination) to 1 (perfect discrimination). Casual mediation analysis was conducted to analyse the effect of group discrimination in explaining these inequalities.

Results

The statistical models used in the study revealed key insights. Model IV, which incorporated all the variables, highlighted that individuals with ethnic backgrounds and financial difficulties faced a notably higher risk of low life satisfaction (LLS), with their risks being 60% and five times higher, respectively. On the other hand, women appeared to have a lower risk of LLS.

Further analyses delved into intersectional gradients within the population. It was observed that native women and men with ethnic backgrounds who faced financial difficulties had the highest LLS risks, with their risks being 9.9 and 10.2 times higher, respectively. These groups were followed by immigrant women and men with ethnic backgrounds experiencing financial difficulties, with risks being 6.6 and 5.3 times higher, respectively.

The results of the causal mediation analysis showed that group discrimination explained about 25% of the low life satisfaction among native men and women of ethnic minorities with economic difficulties. It also accounted for 9.5% and 8% of the low life satisfaction of immigrant women and men, respectively, with economic difficulties.

Conclusion

Individuals from ethnic minorities and those facing financial hardships are at a higher risk for low life satisfaction. Discrimination accounts for a considerable portion of native ethnic minorities and immigrants experiencing economic difficulties.

This research investigates the hypothesis that in European countries with higher levels of institutional trust, citizens are more likely to perceive that, with collective action, governments will be successful in reducing climate change. Using a multivariate regression approach, I draw on data from Round 10 of the European Social Survey (ESS), capturing a comprehensive snapshot of public sentiment and trust in government institutions. The dependent variable is constructed from respondents' assessments of government's handling of climate change, while relevant independent variables include citizens' views of key government institutions, encompassing trust in parliament, politicians, and political parties.

Preliminary findings suggest a strong correlation between institutional trust and the perceived ability of governments to tackle climate change in a collective fashion. Trust in the European Parliament and politicians emerge as critical predictors in shaping citizens' perceptions of government’s role in addressing the climate emergency. High levels of trust in these institutions contribute significantly to a positive assessment of government efforts, reinforcing the hypothesis that institutional trust plays a pivotal role in shaping public attitudes towards climate change initiatives.

This research contributes to the ongoing discourse on the intersection of trust, governance, and climate action. Building on the insights of Kulin and Johansson Sevä (2021), whose findings highlight the significance of individual-level trust in both partial and impartial government institutions as important determinants of climate policy attitudes, this study extends the investigation to encompass citizens' perceptions of overall government effectiveness in addressing the climate emergency.

The presentation of my findings will provide a platform for engagement, discussion, and collaboration. By fostering a collective effort towards a more sustainable and trusted future, this research seeks to contribute meaningfully to the ongoing global efforts in addressing the challenges posed by climate change.

References:

Joakim Kulin & Ingemar Johansson Sevä (2021) Who do you trust? How trust in partial and impartial government institutions influences climate policy attitudes, Climate Policy, 21:1, 33-46, DOI: 10.1080/14693062.2020.1792822

The liberalization of immigration policies in recent decades has led to significant changes in the demographics of the European population. Most European countries have ratified international treaties protecting the rights of minorities, and have adopted public policies to promote equality and tolerance. However, despite the progress made, ethnic minorities in Europe continue to suffer discrimination. This discrimination can manifest itself in various forms, such as social exclusion, lack of access to public services, or physical or verbal violence. A large literature has addressed the effect on health of perceived discrimination, racism, and other discriminatory elements embedded in social structures. Why is it important to understand the effect of discrimination on health? To improve our understanding of health inequalities in Europe. Including information on the effect of discrimination can help us to better understand the causes of these inequalities and to develop strategies to reduce them.

This study contributes to the understanding of the determinants of self-perceived health in Europe, focusing in particular on the effect of discrimination. The empirical analysis is based on the last two waves of the European Social Survey (ESS). The European Social Survey (ESS) has a wide range of social and behavioral determinants affecting health for a sample of 25 European countries. This is very useful, as social surveys usually do not have much information on health, and health surveys do not have detailed information on discrimination or perceived feelings of exclusion. We model the relationship between perceived discrimination and self-rated health using an ordered logit and find that discrimination has a negative and statistically significant effect on self-perceived health, controlling for both sociodemographic and socioeconomic factors.

This poster focuses on youth’s ordinary conceptions of democracy in Europe. Particular attention has been paid here to the impact of age on attachment to democracy, and to the effect of geographical location.

Citizens of Western Europe and Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have different relationships towards democracy, in general. However, it is interesting to know whether young citizens (aged 18-29) converge in their attitudes towards democracy, as opposed to their elders, or whether the gap between Western Europe and CEE remains. Hence our question: do young people have a different attachment towards democracy than their elders? And among young people, are there differences between those living in Western Europe and in CEE?

The data used in this study comes from Wave 10 of the ESS. Indeed, the specific module "Europeans' understandings and evaluations of democracy" enabled us to study conceptions of democracy without narrowing ourselves down - as it is too often the case in surveys - to a perception centered on liberal democracy.

The analysis is focused on six countries, in line with Kostelka and Rovny's (2019) distinction between two patterns in ECE, and therefore a possible difference in our findings. Thus, we chose France and Finland, two liberal democracies in Western Europe; Croatia and Estonia, two CEE countries with a Western pattern; and Bulgaria and the Czech Republic, two CEE countries with an Eastern pattern.

We carried out a principal component analysis (PCA) to disentangle views of democracy across age groups, and countries. The results obtained from this PCA were then integrated into linear regressions, using a set of socio-demographic and socio-political variables.

The importance of this poster is twofold: it highlights the democratic preferences of young people in all their diversity, and it nuances their disinterest in democratic regimes. Rather than rejecting democracy as a whole, it is necessary to understand that the younger generations put greater emphasis on alternative forms of democracy to the liberal dominant one, especially if their national context is that of an old Western European democracy.

As misinformation and fake news' impact on global politics and society becomes more and more prominent, there is a compelling need to explore cross-cultural similarities (or variations) in citizens’ conspiracy beliefs. Relying on data from the 10th round of the European Social Survey (ESS), our analysis aims to assess the cross-cultural equivalence of responses to COVID-19 and general conspiracy beliefs survey items across diverse country contexts.

We use multigroup confirmatory factor analysis to test whether conspiracy survey items maintain their meaning and validity across different geographical contexts during the specific time frame of the survey (2020-2022). This approach provides an opportunity to advance our understanding of conspiracy beliefs, investigating their potential as "travelling concepts" that are genuinely comparable within the European context.

Right-wing populism has become one of the major political forces in Western European politics. The gender gap in the right-wing populist vote is a common finding. In many counties, men tend to vote for right-wing populist parties more than women do. There are multiple theories which aim to explain this gap which revolve around difference in attitudes, personality, and economic situation. Clearly there are multiple reasons that leads to this gender gap. As far as I know, no one has yet determined to what extent each of these hypothesised factors uniquely contributes to the gender gap. Thus, I use a Kitagawa-Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition to determine, firstly, to what the gender gap can be explained, and, secondly, how do different variables contribute to the explained part of the gap. The European Social Survey is utilised to test attitudes, personality properties, economic situation and voting within 17 Western European countries. As expected, gender differences in occupational class, and time spent in the labour force explain some of the gap. Thus, results show that economic properties do explain some of the gender difference, contrary to the claims seen in previous works. However, measures of attitudes and wellbeing only hide the true extent of the gender gap. This means that women tend to eschew right-wing populist parties even though they are more likely to be endowed with attitudes and personality properties which predict higher right-wing populist support. The implications of this are explored.

As self-administered surveys become increasingly prevalent, understanding factors influencing respondent engagement and cognitive effort becomes critical. Gamification, integrating game design elements into surveys, is proposed as a strategy to enhance motivation and combat satisficing behavior. While previous research has demonstrated the efficacy of gamification in various contexts, its impact on cognitive load remains uncertain, particularly within academic studies. This study addresses this gap by investigating the effects of gamification on cognitive effort and data quality among 18-25-year-old participants.

A laboratory experiment was conducted with 128 students randomly assigned to either a non-gamified or gamified web survey design. Gamification elements included emojis for ordinal scales and motivating memes between question sets. The cognitive effort was assessed multi-modally, including neurophysiological indicators (pupil diameter dynamics), subjective evaluation (NASA-TLX scale), and behavioral measures or paradata (mouse movements, completion times).

Contrary to expectations, participants in the gamified group exhibited heightened cognitive effort based on neurophysiological indicators, suggesting increased cognitive load. However, subjective evaluations and behavioral measures indicated decreased cognitive effort among gamified participants. Attention levels were significantly higher in the gamified condition, as evidenced by lower missed items and alert rates. Importantly, data quality, measured by criterion validity and item nonresponse, did not differ between groups.

This study highlights the complex interplay between gamification, cognitive load, and respondent engagement in self-completion surveys. Despite the increased cognitive effort, gamification enhances motivation and attention, resulting in comparable data quality to non-gamified surveys. However, caution is warranted regarding the cultural relevance of gamification elements, particularly memes and emojis, in cross-cultural studies.

Future research should explore diverse gamification designs and participant groups to elucidate optimal strategies for increasing respondent engagement while minimizing cognitive load. Additionally, investigating the potential for gamification to enhance participation rates in snowball sampling designs warrants further exploration.

Existing research has predominantly focused on individual factors influencing fertility intentions, overlooking the role of structural and economic contexts. This study addresses this gap by investigating the impact of the 2007-09 Great Recession on fertility intentions within a cross-country and regional framework.

Specifically, I examine shifts in the intention to become parents within the next three years, taking into account national and regional uncertainties surrounding parenthood during two distinct time frames (2004-06 and 2010-12). The Great Recession acts as an external factor that may have introduced uncertainties in housing, childcare, and career progression, shaping individuals' choices to either postpone or forgo childbearing.

Using data from the European Social Survey Rounds 2 and 5, the analysis covers 21 European countries on a NUTS-1 regional level. Contextual factors from the EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) and the OECD Family Database construct an index reflecting the prospective uncertainties post-parenthood, incorporating housing situations, childcare availability, unemployment, and in-work poverty. By using a Difference-in-Difference model (DID) and controlling for individual-level factors, including income, gender, and education, this study asks two questions. First, does the worsening context surrounding parenthood, marked for example by fewer childcare possibilities and increased economic uncertainty, influence individuals' intentions to become parents? Second, which groups were most affected by rising uncertainties due to the Great Recession in their decision to become parents?

Preliminary findings suggest a decrease in the proportion of individuals intending to have a child within the next three years in regions severely affected by the Great Recession, with a more pronounced effect observed for men than women. The study sheds light on the nuanced interplay between economic uncertainties and fertility intentions, emphasising the need for a comprehensive understanding of contextual influences on family planning decisions.

In recent years, the growing awareness about child and youth labor issues has led to an enormous literature on the topic. Considering also the current shifting demography of European societies, it is crucial to examine how working life courses, including the work of children and youth, have evolved over time. For example, in Europe, as the population ages and retires, younger individuals are spending more time in education, entering the labor market later. This shift poses new challenges, such as a shrinking working-age population and labor shortages, and strain on welfare systems. To effectively understand these demographic shifts, understanding the historical changes in the work of young individuals becomes essential. However, in the literature, historical accounts of the decline in the work of minors have usually been provided as single-case studies only for leading economies, leaving behind the periphery. There is also a lack of quantitative evidence and comparative perspective across countries due to the lack of inter-country data sources, especially for the Post-War period. To address this issue, in our research, we contribute by producing new and comparable long series for the work of minors in several European countries since 1950, e.g., the employment rate of children and the average age at starting working. This is done by using retrospective information collected in the European Social Survey on first work experiences of individuals. The novel data series are then studied and analyzed against the main historical drivers of change in the age structure of the workforce in Europe. The results suggest that the work of young individuals in Europe was marked by an initial modest downward trend in the years 1950-1960; a second marked period of a downward trend, characterized by a sharp decline in child employment between 1960-1980 in all three regions; and a final period of stagnation beginning in the early 1980s with the child employment rates remaining relatively stable across European regions until the 1990s. Our findings also reveal an average increase in the starting working age of minors during the Post-War period. This novel stylized fact on labor dynamics indicates shifts in the European workforce towards older, more educated individuals. Moreover, it supports established notions of changes in the socio-historical life-course phase of youth, reflecting the transition from factory to school in the context of industrial capitalism and welfare state development.

The potential of information communication technologies to alter the landscapes of civic activism is not a new idea. Since the early days of internet adoption for public purposes, scholars and practitioners alike have written about transformative potential (Kamarck & Nye, 2002). From a democratic perspective, scholars and popular thinkers alike have suggested internet technologies represent an “electronic agora” that can facilitate a new Athenian-style of direct democracy (Saco, 2002). Some have even questioned the relevance of the State in an information society, though the authority traditional State structures have in the development and dissemination of information ensures not only ongoing relevance but power (May, 2010). However, the studies also found that the despite transformative potential, information communication technologies might do less impact on civic activism than expected, particularly in societies where there are multiple kinds of citizens. Also, we focus on the analysis of differences between Western Europe countries and Central and Eastern European countries regarding the citizen participation online. The question specifically addressed in this poster is: are CEE countries unique in Europe in contrast to WE countries regarding socio-political participation online?

The main data source used in our analysis is the European Social Survey (ESS), Rounds 8, 9 and 10. We provisionally clustering countries into two regions – Western Europe and Central and Eastern Europe. We analyzed what are the differences between Western Europe and Central and Eastern Europe regarding posting or sharing political information online, focusing on several dimensions: 1) cross-national variations and 2) variations in time, and 3) the individual and country level factors, influencing this kind behaviour. The limitations of this study are also highlighted in the poster.

In the wake of declining response rates, survey methodologists often attempt many different means and tools to combat survey fatigue and positively influence the survey climate. These include public relations strategies that attempt to increase public awareness, trust, and interest in the survey. As part of the contact and communication strategy for wave 8 of the ESS, the German national team prepared press materials and sent out press releases to local newspapers in a subset of districts and municipalities, which were sampled as primary sampling units during the first stage of the sampling procedure.

The press release reported on the upcoming wave of the ESS and that interviewers would be travelling the area in the coming weeks, contacting those respondents who were sampled for the study. It was drafted with the professional support of the press office of Bielefeld University. These press releases were part of a concerted effort to increase the public profile of the German ESS sample through different means, such as a national website, social media presence, and the creation and online distribution of a short film introducing the ESS to the broader public. It was intended to test experimentally whether such efforts positively affect response rates. The districts and municipalities where local newspapers were contacted were sampled randomly. For these districts, local newspapers were identified together with email addresses to which the press releases and information materials were sent electronically. We observed whether local newspapers published something about the ESS and the upcoming fieldwork in the following weeks using a professional press monitoring service. A considerable number of articles appeared based on our press materials, yet overall, only a fraction of the local outlets we contacted did publish something in the end. Articles that did appear were primarily minor, brief recounts of the press release. Overall, the number of articles needed to be bigger to analyse whether these had any meaningful impact on response rates in these districts and response rates. While we must conclude that these efforts did not pay off as intended, we also forwarded articles published to those interviewers who worked in areas where the article appeared. Anecdotal evidence from interviewer comments suggests that these were helpful as doorstep material to support the legitimacy of the ESS, at least in some instances.

This study uses two waves of the European Social Survey (2006/07 and 2018/19) to examine the evolution of attitudes toward mothers and fathers of young children remaining in full-time employment in Spain from the mid-2000s to today. The results show that being a parent of a young child and having a full-time job has different implications for women and men. While men who do not adapt their career paths to care from the outset currently face greater disapproval, a double standard remains. Mothers of young children employed full time have lower approval rates than their male counterparts, both in the past and in the present day. Moreover, women and men apply this social norm disproportionately to their own and the other gender. Women are more approving of fathers of children under three working full time than men, which confirms greater resistance to considering fathers capable of caring for young children among women than among men themselves. Younger men reject more traditional gender roles and advocate that both parents should work less during the early years of their child's life. Among men, gender positioning concerning full-time employment among mothers of young children is strongly determined by educational attainment.

The European Foundations for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) has commissioned Verian to conduct the eighth edition of the European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) in Spring 2024 in 35 countries. As part of Eurofound’s strategy for future-proofing its surveys, the EWCS 2024 will be conducted as a parallel run design via face-to-face and online interviewing in all EU Member States (using a telephone push-to-web or a postal push-to-web approach). To maximise the learnings and identify good practices for online probability-based interviewing the online component includes a range of test elements.

A key test element is the duration of the online questionnaire. The questionnaire for the face-to-face segment of the EWCS takes around 45 minutes to complete. Ideally, respondents completing the survey online would complete the same questionnaire. However, there are concerns about the impact of perceived respondent burden, often associated with survey length ton survey response – potentially increasing response bias and survey cost – and on data quality – which might deteriorate towards the end of the questionnaire.

To assess these effects, respondents in the online segment of the survey are randomly allocated to one of two conditions in terms of questionnaire duration: full (ca 40-45 minutes) or abridged (ca 20-25 minutes). The sample split is informed by the results of a pilot test carried out in all countries, with a view to maximise the likelihood of achieving an even split in the net sample. This implies that in most countries, a larger proportion of the gross sample is allocated to the “full” condition, in some countries the gross sample is split evenly, and in a few countries a larger proportion of the gross sample is allocated to the “abridged” condition. The experimental trials are implemented a full factorial design, ensuring that all other test elements (incentives and within household selection) are applied with the same sample split in each questionnaire duration condition.

To maximise the number of respondents that complete the full questionnaire, those allocated to the “abridged” conditions, are, upon completion of the abridged questionnaire (which entitles them to their conditional incentive), asked to also complete an additional module which contains the questions from the full questionnaire that were not included in the abridged questionnaire.

In this paper we will discuss the results of this test, assessing the differences between the questionnaire duration conditions in terms of yield, sample composition, and data quality. We will also discuss the effectiveness of the request to complete the additional module. Where viable we will also explore the interactions between the questionnaire duration conditions, and the test conditions in terms of incentive levels and within household selection.

As is reflected in the mainstage sample allocation, the pilot test suggested a negative impact of questionnaire duration on yield in most countries. Analysis of the mainstage data will allow assessing this overall reduction of yield, and the impact on the cost per item, against the impact on response bias and data quality.

The rationale behind economic voting is simple: the citizen votes for the government if the economy is doing all right; otherwise, the vote is against (Lewis-Beck and Stegmaier 2000). However, various studies have found cross-country and across-time variation regarding the intensity of economic voting (e.g., Paldam 1991; Anderson 1995; Duch and Stevenson 2008), leading an increasing number of scholars to discuss and test potential moderators of the economic vote equation (e.g., Anderson 2000; Duch and Stevenson 2008). Nonetheless, only a few authors have regarded the characteristics of the alternative to the underperforming incumbent, the opposition, as potential moderating factors (Anderson 2000; Maeda 2009; Ferrer 2023). Therefore, the goal of this paper is to understand how the configuration of the parliamentary opposition, regarding its fragmentation and polarization, impacts its viability as an alternative and, consequently, the intensity of economic voting. Using data from 208 elections that took place in 29 European democracies between 1989 and 2021, I found that a more fragmented opposition actually increases the intensity of economic voting. However, I did not reach any statistically significant conclusions regarding the effect of the polarization of the opposition on the intensity of economic voting.

The European Social Survey (ESS) is an academically driven cross-national survey that has been conducted across Europe since its establishment in 2001. Every two years, it collects data from face-to-face interviews with newly selected, cross-sectional samples. Over the years, ESS has been asserted as an important pan-European research infrastructure providing freely accessible data for academics, policymakers, civil society and the wider public. In Portugal, ESS has been collected since 2002, being one of the most reliable and quality sources of data on values and attitudes regarding a broad variety of social issues. To date, Portugal participated in all ESS editions being available on the ESS website all data and documentation to support fieldwork. Moreover, specific rotary modules have had an important impact to understand work, family, and well-being (edition 2, 2004/05); organization of the life course (edition 3, 2006/07); family, work, and well-being (edition 5, 2010/11); ages of life (edition 9, 2018/19); digital contacts in family and at work (edition 10, 2021/22); gender roles (edition 11, 2023/24). Recognizing the importance of ESS to understand broader changes in Portuguese society, and in particular, the continuity and changing trends on attitudes to family, this paper constitutes an original contribution from the current coordination team of the Thematic Section on Families and Life Course (ST-FCV) of the Portuguese Sociological Association (APS), elected last May 2023. Specifically, this paper aims at presenting and reflecting on the role of ESS to understand change in how individuals think and live family life over the last 20 years. Focusing specifically on the Portuguese society, this paper intends to present, contrast, and compare the broad contribution of ESS to portray the current attitudinal landscape, understand change over time, and foster research both at national and cross-national level. Methodologically, the paper comprises an analysis and comparison of the questionnaires used in the several rounds, as well as of the published research paperss, books, and policy briefs it inspired. Ultimately and transversally, this paper is an opportunity to pay a sense and recognized tribute to João Ferreira de Almeida, member of the ESS Scientific Advisory Board (2002-2017), and a renamed Portuguese sociologist who left us last 2022, and that had a leading and decisive role on the participation of Portugal in the ESS since the beginning of the project. He also gave a strong and consistent contribution to understand the core changes in the dynamics of the contemporary Portuguese society and to inspire younger generations of sociologists. This paper honours such an indelible contribution.

The European Social Survey (ESS) has been one of the cornerstones in comparative quantitative social science research for the past two decades. This poster presentation aims to provide a general overview of ESS academic usage. It will be focused on the following six elements:

• Outlining the main steps in the workflow of the annual bibliographic exercise, presenting the primary processes and key outputs, including citations, publication texts, data files, and reports.

• Presenting the use of ESS across a variety of academic communities with sociology, political science, and economics as primary domains, but with rotating modules extending its impact into narrower academic communities.

• Presenting the structure of research topics and most common theoretical approaches across key research areas, including politics, immigration, family research, demographic issues, well-being and health etc.

• Presenting statistics on geographical distribution of ESS based authors, offering insights into the global impact of the ESS and highlighting hotspot areas.

• Presenting patterns of ESS survey instrument utilization, with the ABC core being the most utilized attitudinal section and many of the rotating modules accumulating high publication numbers (e.g. Immigration, Work & Family, Welfare, Wellbeing)

• Illustrating the engagement of researchers with different ESS rounds over the years, providing an insight into the temporal dynamics of survey utilization, particularly the continued importance of earlier rounds, both for cross-time and cross-section analysis.

In sum, the presentation will offer a panoramic view of ESS academic usage based on key chapters from the ESS Annual Bibliographic Reports. It will provide conference participants with the latest snapshot of the multifaceted impact of the ESS, as well as a cumulative overview on the scope, geographical and disciplinary patterns of ESS academic usage spanning the past two decades. The poster seems a particularly suitable format as participants can refer to it throughout the conference event.