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Press Release on January 3, 2017

| Detailed Findings (People's Level of Concern about Political, Economic and livelihood problems) |

| Detailed Findings (People's Satisfaction with Current Political, Economic and livelihood conditions) |

Special Announcements

1. To facilitate academic study and rational discussion, the Public Opinion Programme (POP) of The University of Hong Kong has already released for public examination some time ago via the HKU POP SITE” (http://hkupop.pori.hk) the raw data of all 112 regular rating surveys of CE CY Leung, as well as the 181 regular rating surveys of former CE Donald Tsang and 239 regular rating surveys of former CE CH Tung, along with related demographics of respondents. Please follow normal academic standards when using or citing such data.

2. Since the figures released by POP today come from the last tracking survey on this topic conducted by POP in 2016, they are good for year-end stories. Moreover, a chronology of major events as reported by the local newspapers over the past many years can be found in the “Opinion Daily” at the “POP Site”. This may also be useful in running year-end reviews.

Abstract

POP interviewed 1,009 Hong Kong people from December 19 to 22, 2016 by means of a random telephone survey conducted by real interviewers. The survey shows that using a one-in-three choices method, people are currently most concerned with livelihood issues, followed by economic and political issues. This has been the usual pattern for many years. Among them, the percentage of those most concerned with economic issues has dropped to its record low since the survey began in 1992. In terms of absolute ratings, the order of people’s concern across three broad areas is exactly the same as that of six months ago. As for the satisfaction figures, people’s net satisfaction of the current livelihood, economic and political conditions continued to be all negative, at negative 25, negative 5 and negative 59 percentage points respectively. Among them, people remain to be least satisfied with the current political condition, and its dissatisfaction rate has reached its record high since the survey began in 1992. In-depth analyses show that the younger and the more educated the respondents, the more dissatisfied they are with the current political condition. The maximum sampling error of all percentages in the survey mentioned is +/-3 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while the sampling errors of rating figures and net values need another calculation. The response rate of the survey is 71%.

Points to note:

[1] The address of the “HKU POP SITE” is http://hkupop.pori.hk, journalists can check out the details of the survey there.

[2] The sample size of this survey is 1,009 successful interviews, not 1,009 x 70.9% response rate. In the past, many media made this mistake.

[3] The maximum sampling error of all percentages is +/-3 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while the sampling error of rating figures and net values needs another calculation. “95% confidence level” means that if we were to repeat a certain survey 100 times, using the same questions each time but with different random samples, we would expect 95 times getting a figure within the error margins specified. When quoting these figures, journalists can state “sampling error of all percentages not more than +/-3%, that of ratings not more than +/-0.15 and net values not more than +/-5 percentage points, at 95% confidence level”.

[4] Because of sampling errors in conducting the survey(s) and the rounding procedures in processing the data, the figures cannot be too precise, and the totals may not be completely accurate. Therefore, when quoting percentages of the survey(s), journalists should refrain from reporting decimal places, but when quoting the rating figures, one decimal place can be used.

[5] The data of this survey is collected by means of random telephone interviews conducted by real interviewers, not by any interactive voice system (IVS). If a research organization uses “computerized random telephone survey” to camouflage its IVS operation, it should be considered unprofessional.

Latest Figures

POP today releases on schedule via the “POP Site” the latest findings of people’s appraisal of society’s conditions. From 2014, POP enhanced the previous simple weighting method based on age and gender distribution to “rim weighting” based on age, gender and education (highest level attended) distribution. The latest figures released today have been rim-weighted according to provisional figures obtained from the Census and Statistics Department regarding the gender-age distribution of the Hong Kong population in 2016 mid-year and the educational attainment (highest level attended) distribution collected in the 2011 Census. Herewith the contact information for the latest survey:

[6] Calculated at 95% confidence level using full sample size. “95% confidence level” means that if we were to repeat a certain survey 100 times, using the same questions each time but with different random samples, we would expect 95 times getting a figure within the error margins specified.

Recent figures of people’s appraisal of society’s conditions are summarized as follows:

[7] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. “95% confidence level” means that if we were to repeat a certain survey 100 times, using the same questions each time but with different random samples, we would expect 95 times getting a figure within the error margins specified. Media can state “sampling error of all percentages not more than +/-3%, that of ratings not more than +/-0.15 and net values not more than +/-5 percentage points, at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. The error margin of previous survey can be found at the POP Site.

[8] The wordings used before the June 2010 survey were “social problems” and “social condition”. We take them to mean the same as “livelihood problems” and “livelihood condition” in the survey context.

[9] Collapsed from a 5-point scale. The mean value is calculated by quantifying all individual responses into 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 marks according to their degree of positive level, where 1 is the lowest and 5 the highest, and then calculate the sample mean.

[10] Such changes have gone beyond the sampling errors at the 95% confidence level under the same weighting method, meaning that they are statistically significant prima facie. However, whether numerical differences are statistically significant or not is not the same as whether they are practically useful or meaningful.

Latest survey showed that 63% of the respondents were most concerned with livelihood problems, while 18% and 17% attached their greatest concern to economic problems and political problems respectively. Using a scale of 0-10 marks, the ratings of people’s concern over livelihood, economic and political problems were 7.33, 6.84 and 6.06 marks correspondingly. Meanwhile, people’s satisfaction rates with the current livelihood, economic and political conditions were 25%, 32% and 10% respectively, while their net satisfaction rates in these conditions were negative 25, negative 5 and negative 59 percentage points. The mean scores of the livelihood, economic and political conditions were 2.6, 2.9 and 2.0, meaning the former two were in between “quite dissatisfied” and “half-half”, whereas the latter was close to “quite dissatisfied”.

Indepth Analysis

In the survey, we also asked respondents for their age and education attainment. If they were reluctant to give their exact age, they could give us a range. According to their answers, we grouped them into 18-29, 30-49, and 50 years or older. As for education attainment, according to their answers, we grouped them into primary or below, secondary, and tertiary or above. Herewith further analysis of respondents’ satisfaction with the current political condition in Hong Kong by age and education attainment:

[11] Differences among sub-groups are tested to be statistically significant at 95% confidence level.

[12] Differences among sub-groups are tested to be statistically significant at 95% confidence level.

Opinion Daily

In January 2007, POP opened a feature page called “Opinion Daily” at the “POP Site”, to record significant events and selected polling figures on a day-to-day basis, in order to let readers judge by themselves the reasons for the ups and downs of different opinion figures. In July 2007, POP collaborated with Wisers Information Limited whereby Wisers supplies to POP each day starting from July 24, a record of significant events of that day, according to the research method designed by POP. These daily entries would be uploaded to “Opinion Daily” as soon as they are verified by POP.

For the polling items covered in this press release, some items within the previous survey were conducted from June 27 to 30, 2016 while this survey was conducted from December 19 to 22, 2016. In between these two surveys, herewith the significant events selected from counting newspaper headlines and commentaries on a daily basis and covered by at least 25% of the local newspaper articles. Readers can make their own judgment if these significant events have any impacts to different polling figures.

Commentary

Frank Wai-kin Lee, Research Manager of POP, observed, “According to our latest survey, using a one-in-three choices method, people are currently most concerned with livelihood issues, followed by economic and political issues. This has been the usual pattern for many years. Among them, the percentage of those most concerned with economic issues has dropped to its record low since the survey began in 1992. In terms of absolute ratings, the order of people’s concern across three broad areas is exactly the same as that of six months ago. As for the satisfaction figures, people’s net satisfaction of the current livelihood, economic and political conditions continued to be all negative, at negative 25, negative 5 and negative 59 percentage points respectively. Among them, people remain to be least satisfied with the current political condition, and its dissatisfaction rate has reached its record high since the survey began in 1992. In-depth analyses show that the younger and the more educated the respondents, the more dissatisfied they are with the current political condition. We leave it for our readers to figure out the reasons for such feelings using detailed records shown in our ‘Opinion Daily’ feature page.”

Future Releases (Tentative)

• January 5, 2017 (Thursday) 1pm to 2pm: Second part of Macau annual survey 2016
• January 10, 2017 (Tuesday) 1pm to 2pm: Popularity of CE and Principal Officials

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Everything carried in this website does not represent the stand of the University of Hong Kong. Dr Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, is responsible for everything posted herewith, except for column articles and messages posted at the opinion platforms. Any responsibility, legal and otherwise, arising from any such item shall vest entirely with its author. The intellectual property of all information contained in this website, including questionnaire design and research reports, originally belongs to HKU POP unless specified otherwise. HKU POP opens their copyright to the world via this website, but would request all users to acknowledge their source properly.

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Last update :  26/6/2019