HKU POP releases popularity figures of top 5 Hong Kong disciplinary forces and the PLA Hong Kong GarrisonBack

(1) The Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong has recently released a “survey on Hong Kong people’s ethnic identity” and some Public Sentiment Index (PSI) analyses, which include a large amount of reference material, readers are welcome to click on “What’s New” at “HKU POP SITE” (website: http://hkupop.pori.hk) to read them in detail.

(2) POP conducted a headcount of July 1 Rally participants on July 1, and released its preliminary results via the “HKU POP SITE” in the evening on the same day. Same as last year, to facilitate the public to do their own headcount of the Rally, POP will upload the full version of video record of the Rally to the “PopCon” e-platform (http://popcon.hk) 10 days after the Rally.

(3) The list of newly appointed Principal Officials of the SAR government was announced on June 28. POP, thus, has immediately started a survey to gauge their suitability as designate Principal Officials, and the results will be released on July 5. Kindly take note.

POP conducted a double stage survey on people’s satisfaction with the top 5 disciplinary forces in June by means of random telephone surveys conducted by real interviewers. The survey shows that in terms of relative rankings according to satisfaction scores, among the ‘top 5’ Hong Kong disciplinary forces, Hong Kong Fire Services Department ranks first, Government Flying Services ranks second, Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department and Hong Kong Immigration Department rank third and fourth, while Hong Kong Police Force ranks fifth. In terms of absolute satisfaction ratings, all ‘top 5’ disciplinary forces get more than 60 marks, while Hong Kong Fire Services Department gets a very high score of 80.1 marks. Around 90% are satisfied with its performance, while close to zero are unsatisfied, giving a net satisfaction of positive 87 percentage points. It is definitely the most popular disciplinary force in Hong Kong. On the other hand, compared to six months ago, people’s satisfaction rate with Hong Kong Police Force has significantly dropped, while their satisfaction with the PLA Hong Kong Garrison remains stable. Net satisfaction rates of the two forces now stand at positive 41 and positive 45 percentage points respectively. It should be noted that our list of ‘top 5’ only includes disciplinary forces best known to the public, ranked according to their satisfaction ratings. Some of other disciplinary forces may well have very high or low satisfaction ratings, but because they are not the most well-known forces, they do not appear on the list by design. As for the reasons affecting the differences as well as the ups and downs of these figures, we leave it to our readers to form their own judgment using the detailed records displayed in the ‘Opinion Daily’ of our POP Site. The maximum sampling error of all percentage figures is +/-4 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while that of rating figures is below +/-2.2 marks. The response rate of the satisfaction survey is 65%.

Since its establishment in 1991, POP has been conducting different types of opinion studies on social and political issues. Shortly after the handover of Hong Kong in July 1997, POP began our regular surveys on people's satisfaction with the performance of the Hong Kong Police Force and PLA Hong Kong Garrison. At the beginning, the surveys were conducted once every month. Then in September 2000 the frequency was changed to once every two months. Since October 2003, the surveys have been conducted once every three months to cope with the changing social conditions until December 2011. In 2012, as Hong Kong marks its 15th anniversary of the handover, POP again revised the design of this survey series, by splitting the survey into two stages. A naming survey of people’s most familiar disciplinary forces in Hong Kong would be conducted first, then a survey on people’s satisfaction with their top 6 most familiar disciplinary forces as well as the PLA Hong Kong Garrison would be conducted according to the results of the naming survey. All findings of these surveys are published regularly at the HKU POP Site.

The survey results released by POP today via the "POP SITE" have been, as a general practice, weighted according to provisional figures obtained from the Census and Statistics Department regarding the gender-age distribution of the Hong Kong population in 2011 year-end.

[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. Sampling errors of ratings are calculated according to the distribution of the scores collected.

The research design of our “Top 5 Hong Kong disciplinary forces” satisfaction survey is similar to that of various “Top 10” series conducted by POP, it is explained in detail under “Survey Method” in our web page. The Hong Kong disciplinary forces listed in our latest survey are those which obtained highest unprompted mentions in our first stage naming survey conducted in early June. In that survey, respondents could name, unaided, up to 5 Hong Kong disciplinary forces which they knew best, with the following results:

[7] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. “95% confidence level”, meaning 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 percentages not more than +/-4% at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. Numbers in square brackets { } indicates rankings in our naming survey. Disciplinary Forces with the same recognition rate will be ranked according to the decimal place of the corresponding percentages. The error margin of previous surveys can also be found at the POP Site. The sub-sample size for this survey is 645.

The naming survey conducted in early June showed that Hong Kong Police Force was named most frequently with a recognition rate of 74%. Hong Kong Fire Services Department, Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department, Hong Kong Immigration Department, Hong Kong Correctional Services and Government Flying Service with recognition rate of 65%, 49%, 34%, 34% and 9%, ranked the 2nd to 6th. However, 24% could not name any disciplinary forces.

The 6 disciplinary forces which were named most frequently then entered into the second stage satisfaction survey. At the second stage satisfaction survey conducted in mid-June, respondents were asked to rate each of the 6 short-listed disciplinary forces in turn using a 0-100 scale, with 0 meaning very dissatisfied, 100 meaning very satisfied, and 50 meaning half-half. After calculation, the bottom 1 disciplinary force in terms of recognition rate was dropped; the remaining 5 were then ranked according to their satisfaction ratings attained to become the top 5 disciplinary forces. Recent ratings of the “top 5” disciplinary forces are tabulated as follows:

[8] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. “95% confidence level”, meaning 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 percentages not more than +/-4%, while that of various ratings not more than +/-1.9 marks at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. Numbers in square brackets { } indicate the rankings.
[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.

The satisfaction survey conducted in mid-June showed that Hong Kong Fire Services Department ranked first, attaining 80.1 marks, 89% of the citizens interviewed were satisfied with its performance, 2% were not satisfied, with a net satisfaction rate of positive 87 percentage points and a mean value of 4.3 marks, which is between “quite satisfied” and “very satisfied”. Government Flying Service ranked the second with 77.1 marks, 72% were satisfied with its performance. Its net satisfaction rate stands at positive 72 percentage points, with a mean value of 4.1 marks, meaning close to “quite satisfied”. The 3rd to 5th ranks went to Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department, Hong Kong Immigration Department and Hong Kong Police Force, with satisfaction ratings at 72.6, 72.4 and 63.0 marks respectively. Their corresponding satisfaction rates obtained were 75%, 76% and 55%, and their net satisfaction stand at positive 69, 72 and 41 percentage points in respective order, while their respective mean values registered were 3.9, 3.9 and 3.5 marks, meaning between “half-half” and “quite satisfied” in general. In this survey, Hong Kong Correctional Services obtained a rating of 68.5 marks, 54% citizens interviewed were satisfied with its performance, but it was dropped due to its relatively low recognition rate.

Before 2012, this survey series registered peoples’ satisfaction level of the “Hong Kong Police” together with that of the PLA Hong Kong Garrison. The former is now renamed in the survey as “Hong Kong Police Force” while the latter remains unchanged. Here are the results of the last surveys:

[10] 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 percentages not more than +/-4% at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. The error margin of previous survey can be found at the POP Site. 
[11] 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.
[12] The wordings used in surveys before 2012 were “Are you satisfied with the performance of the Hong Kong Police?”
[13] Assuming that the change in questionnaire wording from “HKP” to “HKPF” has no significant effect, such changes have gone beyond the sampling errors at the 95% confidence level, 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.
[14] Starting from 2011, these questions only uses sub-samples of the tracking surveys concerned, the sample size for each question also varies.

Results of survey conducted in mid-June show that the satisfaction rating of PLA is 67.3 marks, 49% are satisfied with the performance of the PLA stationed in Hong Kong, only 4% are dissatisfied, giving a net satisfaction of positive 45 percentage points, and a mean scores of 3.8, meaning “quite satisfied” in general.

Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, observed, “In terms of relative rankings according to satisfaction scores, among the ‘top 5’ Hong Kong disciplinary forces, Hong Kong Fire Services Department ranks first, Government Flying Services ranks second, Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department and Hong Kong Immigration Department rank third and fourth, while Hong Kong Police Force ranks fifth. In terms of absolute satisfaction ratings, all ‘top 5’ disciplinary forces get more than 60 marks, while Hong Kong Fire Services Department gets a very high score of 80.1 marks. Around 90% are satisfied with its performance, while close to zero are unsatisfied, giving a net satisfaction of positive 87 percentage points. It is definitely the most popular disciplinary force in Hong Kong. On the other hand, compared to six months ago, people’s satisfaction rate with Hong Kong Police Force has significantly dropped, while their satisfaction with the PLA Hong Kong Garrison remains stable. Net satisfaction rates of the two forces now stand at positive 41 and positive 45 percentage points respectively. It should be noted that our list of ‘top 5’ only includes disciplinary forces best known to the public, ranked according to their satisfaction ratings. Some of other disciplinary forces may well have very high or low satisfaction ratings, but because they are not the most well-known forces, they do not appear on the list by design. As for the reasons affecting the differences as well as the ups and downs of these figures, we leave it to our readers to form their own judgment using the detailed records displayed in the ‘Opinion Daily’ of our POP Site.”

• July 5, 2012 (Thursday) 1pm to 2pm: Suitability of designate Principal Officials

• July 10, 2012 (Tuesday) 1pm to 2pm: Ratings of top 10 political groups