Within the framework of the project, in total 6 polling rounds with 3,630 successful interviews were completed.
The first 4 polling rounds were based on the panel provided by CRRC (Caucasus Research Resource Centers), which comprised around 600 respondents. The panel was collected through face-to-face survey across the country in February 2011 and was a fair and accurate representation of the country’s demographics.
The last 2 polling rounds were based on a new panel of around 1300 respondents. The panel was formed based on a multi-stage clustered stratified sample developed by the polling project team. The results of the surveys of this panel were projected on the entire population of Armenia, as the whole data was weighted both for individual and household dimensions and, therefore, the results were credibly generalized on the population level.
Telephone interviews were used with both groups of respondents and ensured 100% coverage of the population reaching landline only households, mobile only households and those with both a landline and a mobile phone.
All questions were vetted thru CRRC in Tbilisi, and its director, Dr. Hans Gutbrod. The nature of the questions was agreed upon in Yerevan. The interviews were conducted to produce representative samples of the population in terms of age, gender, social background and geographical distribution across the country. Below, is the brief report on the surveys.
Key topic: Constitution
Date: July, 3-4
Successful calls: 847
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 3.4%
During the two days that led up to July 5th, which marks Armenian Constitution Day, the Civilitas Foundation conducted telephone interviews with 1,100 individuals, of which 847 provided successful responses. The results were weighted according to age and gender distributions in Armenia, producing a margin of error of 3.4 percent. Polls show that 39 percent of respondents are completely unfamiliar with the fundamental principles of the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia, while 30 percent are familiar with a small part. Only 3 percent of the respondents are completely familiar with all articles of the Constitution. The overwhelming majority does not believe that a person’s dignity is respected and protected by the state. When asked whether today’s state upholds the Constitution’s principles on human rights, more than half of the people said it does not. Only 9 percent believe that the state respects and protects a person’s dignity.
51% of Armenia’s population do not agree that the Constitution’s provision that “each individual has the right to freedom of speech, and the freedom to seek, receive and disseminate information “ reflects Armenia’s reality today.
One of the pillars of democracy and a constitutional norm, which dictates that everyone is equal before the law, is not a reality in Armenia according to 73 percent of respondents. In fact, only 10 percent believe that the state adheres to this principle. It is also noteworthy that the overwhelming majority, 83 percent, firmly believes that someone accused of a crime is obliged to prove his/her innocence. However, the law states that someone accused of a crime are not obliged to prove his/her innocence.
Key topic: Census
Date: March, 22-24
Successful calls: 896
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 3%
The decrease of the population reported during the most recent census was the main focus of the poll, concentrating on the reasons for decrease, perspective policies to be adopted for the increase of the population, the responsible for emigration people and bodies and the steps the people or the bodies have to undertake to reduce the emigration.
What is the main reason for the population decrease? 85% of the population thinks the reason for decrease is emigration, and altogether only 14% of the population thinks the reasons can be Decreased birth rates or increased death rates. Those who reported a different answer rather than picking one of the choices provided, were eliminated from the initial data and analyzed separately. Overall 18% of the population mentioned different than the listed answers. The most frequent answer among the “Other” responses was unemployment, bad living conditions and bad social conditions.
What are the main policies that the people consider as the most attractive ones for the families to have children, if they cannot decide whether to have children or not. Nearly 63% of the respondents mentioned that the most attractive for them program is the “allocation of monthly amount for each child before the age 18”. The second most attractive program is the subsidized housing with 18%. Among those people who preferred to give a different answer than the ones mentioned the most frequent answer was providing jobs for the parents. As onetime payment the respondents mainly mentioned the amount between 10,000 and 99,000 AMD. The second most frequent answer was the amount between the 200,000 and 299,000AMD. As monthly payment vast majority of the people, 90%, mentioned an amount between 2000 and 100,000 AMD.
55 % of the respondents think that the president has the primary responsibility to prevent emigration from the country. The second responsible body is the government (20%) and only 4% of the respondents think the society has to bear the primary responsibility. What should the primary step be to prevent the emigration?
78%of the population thinks that the primary step should be the creation of more jobs in the country. Only 2% of the population thinks that reducing corruption will have significant impact on preventing emigration. Moreover 0.3% of the population thinks that strengthening democracy in the country will help prevent the emigration from the country. Better army conditions, better education systems, better healthcare conditions are also not considered to be the steps to prevent emigration, 0.1%, 0.5% and 0.3% respectively. And another 2% mentioned strengthening the rule of law as a necessary step towards preventing emigration. 25% of the respondents mentioned salary raise as a necessary step that has to be undertaken to prevent emigration, while 13% mentioned relieved taxation policies.
Key topic: Independence of Armenia
Date: September 16-18
Successful calls: 1074
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 3%
This poll was conducted a few days before Independence Day, September 21, and addressed such questions as independence of Armenia, the attitude towards the dissolution of the Soviet Union and towards being Armenian in general. The first question asked was: “Is Armenia’s Independence Day a celebration for you?” 88 % said that Independence Day is a celebration for them, whereas only 10% of respondents said it is not. The share of those who gave a negative answer in Yerevan was higher than that in the entire population.
The second question addressed the attitude of the population to the dissolution of the Soviet Union. 40% of the respondents mentioned that they regretted that the Soviet Union had been dissolved. 32% of Armenian population answered that they “neither regret, nor are glad” about the collapse of the Soviet Union and only 23% of the respondents was glad about its dissolution. The responses to the question do not vary considerably across gender, while age group analysis shows a little variance. The share of the respondents of the age group from 17 to 35, who expressed regret about the collapse of the Soviet Union, is larger than that of the older generation (those aged 55 and above), comprising 41% and 33% respectively. Although 88% of the informants considered Independence Day a celebration, only 69% of Armenians said that they would vote for independence, if the referendum for independence from the Soviet Union were held today. Moving back in time to 1991, a fast look at the real referendum of independence of Armenia from the Soviet Union: 99% of Armenians expressed their will to be independent. Today 17% of the population would vote against independence, and 13% did not know what answer to give. Of the respondents aged 36 to 54, three-fourths would vote for independence from the Soviet Union, if the referendum were held today. The 55+ age group, who were at the center of the events in 1991, reported much lower than average score, 62%. Men tend to show a higher percentage of “for” answers than women.
The correlation between the responses to the two questions “Is Armenia’s independence Day a celebration for you?” and “If the referendum for independence from the Soviet Union were held today, would you be for or against?” is not-surprisingly high.
The last question of this polling round was meant to assess to what extent the residents are proud to be a citizen of Armenia. 87% of the population said they were proud to be a citizen of Armenia, 6% said they were neither “proud” nor “not proud”, 5% reported being not proud and 2% did not know how to respond to the question.
Key topic: Migration
Date: October, 7-9
Successful calls: 1056
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 3% The first question asked was whether the respondent has a family member living abroad. 71% of the population said they did not have any family members abroad, while 27% of the respondents had relatives living abroad.
The next question explored the attitude of the population towards temporary and permanent migration, and whether they consider any of those as an option in the near future. The attitude of the population to temporary and permanent migration differed extremely. 72% of Armenians mentioned that they would not leave Armenia permanently, and 48% said they would not leave Armenia temporarily.
While talking about the reasons for emigration, the respondents said social and the economic situation in the country — 39%, unemployment — 30% and the lack of justice/rule of law — 4%.
In cross poll analysis, it is interesting to underline the differences between the attitudes of the population towards permanent emigration among age groups. With 28%, the respondents in the youngest age group were more willing to leave the country than all the other groups. Meanwhile, the population aged 55 and above was least intent to leave the country permanently — 81%. The willingness of the informants to leave Armenia permanently differs slightly across gender.
In an odd correlation, 85% of the Armenian population, who said they would leave Armenia permanently were proud to be citizens of Armenia.
Key topic: Internet usage
Date: June 3-5
Successful calls: 390
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 5% The principle theme of this poll was centered around internet usage patterns of the respondents. In total 6 questions were asked. The polling revealed that only 21% of the respondents use internet on a daily basis, while 46% of the respondents reported never to use internet. The share of respondents using internet once a week and once a month comprised 16% and 12% respectively. Concerning the average duration of internet visits, almost half of those using internet – around 44% – spend less than one hour per day using internet. The allotment of those using internet more than 6 hours a day hold only 6%. One in three respondents reported using internet from 1 to 3 hours a day. The time span from 6 pm to midnight was the most commonly period of internet usage with around 68% of respondents reporting to use internet in that time. One third of the respondents used the internet from 12 pm to 6 pm. One in two informants was not able to watch videos with his/her internet connection, as compared to 44% of respondents, who were able to watch videos using their internet connection. Almost half of the respondents reported never to use internet. When asked about the reasons of not using internet, the overwhelming majority of the respondents answered that they could not afford it.
On the same question, one third of the interviewed group of people reported not to have a computer, while one in five interviewed claimed not to have the necessity of the internet. Around 37% of the respondents who did not have internet were pessimistic about the prospects of acquiring internet connection throughout the next 12 months. At the same time, one in 5 respondents assessed the possibility of having internet in the next 12 months as highly likely.
Key topic: Visits to the neighboring countries
Date: June 24-26
Successful calls: 352
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 5%
The first question of this poll was: “Have you visited any of the following countries during the past three years”. The respondents were allowed to choose more than one answer; the provided options were Russia, Georgia and Turkey. 76% of the respondents reported not having visited any of these three countries during the last 3 year period. 13% of the respondents, which is the biggest group, visited Russia. 11% visited Georgia during the past three years. Only 0.3% of the informants said they visited Turkey during the last three years. Only 2 individuals reported having visited all the three countries during the past 3 years.
36% of the people who visited Russia mentioned that they visited their relatives and friends, 30% visited for business purposes and 16% for leisure. More than half of the respondents, 52%, said they visited Georgia for leisure, 22% for visiting relatives and friends and 13% for business or work. In case of Turkey, out of 5 respondents 3 visited for leisure and 1 person visited relatives or friends.
60% of the population mentioned that they do not have family members living in any of these countries. 39% said that they had a family member living in Russia. The share of those, who said they had a family member living in Georgia or Turkey, did exceed 1%.
Finally, the last question of the poll was: “Do you have plans to visit these countries during the next 12 months?” 65% said they had no such plans; 17% were going to visit Russia; 9% – Georgia and 1% of the respondents wanted to visit Turkey. 7 people were planning to visit at least two of these countries and 2 people, all three countries, Russia, Georgia and Turkey.
Key topic: Reading books
Date: July 1-3
Successful calls: 382
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 5%
The first two questions in this poll were attitudinal. The informants were asked to express their opinion on early marriages. As might be expected, the vast majority of respondents – around 70% – considered the idea of a girl getting married before age 18 unacceptable as opposed to 13% of the respondents who regarded marriage before 18 as acceptable. An early marriage of a man was even less acceptable; 89% of the respondents found the marriage of a man below age 18 unacceptable and only 3% of the informants considered the idea of a man getting married before 18 acceptable. In response to the question if the respondents had read any books during the last 12 months, the answer was rather evenly split. Nearly one of two respondents reported not to read books. 48% of informants reported having read books during the last 12 months. When asked about the language of the last book they read, around 75% of respondents reported reading books in Armenian, 18% having read books in Russian, and only 3% were reading books in English. The next poll question related to the genre of the books read by the respondents. Around 59% of respondents said they were reading fiction. 19% and 16% of informants reported reading poetry and non-fiction respectively.
Key topic: Health care
Date: July 8-10
Successful calls: 376
Confidence level: 95%
Margin of error: 5%
The first question of the poll was related to climate change. 68% of the respondents answered that they had noticed considerable climate change, and 25% observed some changes in climate. “Definitely no” and “somewhat no” answers were given by 7% of the respondents.
The following questions directly addressed the health conditions of the respondents. “Have you visited a doctor during the last 12 months?” Almost half of the respondents went to the doctor during the past 12 months and the other half did not.
The respondents were asked to rate their health on a scale from 1(very healthy) to 4 (very unhealthy). 40% of the respondents considered themselves very healthy. 26% of the informants – the second biggest group – considered themselves very unhealthy.
The last two questions assessed the quality and affordability of health care services for the population. Almost one in four respondents – 26% – considered quality of health care services in Armenia as very high. More than half of the respondents, 55% assessed the quality of the healthcare services as average. 17% considered the healthcare quality in Armenia as low. 44% of the respondents think that health care services are of average affordability and 42 % considered healthcare services as not affordable. Only 12% of the respondents found that the healthcare services were very affordable.