Relations, Attitudes

The term – social cohesion is not well known in public. Only 27 % stated they know about it, 55% answered, they have never heard about it, 18% were not sure about it.Almost three quarters of citizens(74%) think it is worth of thinking about it ,two fifths of respondents regard social cohesion as useful.The survey proved, that citizens critically evaluate relationships among people in czech society.

Citizens(90%) said their „ yes“ for keeping schoolsystem to be free of charge.

89% of respondents think, there should exist life-imprisonment for people who commit serious crimes repeatedly. 81% of citizens would welcome full employment ensured by the state. One of supported aims is limiting of immigration from problematic states (76% of respondents).64% of czech citizens wish the taxes for rich people were higher.

In the June survey of the Public Opinion Research Centre, among other things we were interested in how Czech citizens trusted people from various countries. Czechs trust each other the most. The second place on the hypothetical ladder of trust is occupied by Slovaks. More than two thirds of respondents also expressed trust towards French (71 %), Poles (71 %) and Brits (66 %). The Czech population most often distrusts Germans (distrust was voiced by 55 % of respondents), Romanians (51 %) and Turks (43 %).

Traditionally, great importance is attributed to family values. Helping their family and friends and living in a satisfied family is considered as being equally important by 97 % of the approached citizens. Similarly, the absolute majority of respondents (97 %) appreciate having in their lives friends who they get on well with. The items, which obtained the highest degree of support during the entire monitored period, are all statements relating to employment.

Almost 60 % of respondents think that the ideal age for a father at the birth of his first child should range from 25 to 29 years of age. A third of the people approached gave the age over 29 and less than 9 % the age under 25. For judging the ideal age of a mother there is a prevailing opinion (51 % of respondents) that a woman should give birth to her first child before 24 years of age. 44 % of respondents stated the age range between 25 and 29 and only less than 5 % consider the age of 30 or more to be the best for the birth of the first child.

More than a quarter of respondents think that artificial insemination should be available only to married women. One fifth of respondents thought that also unmarried women living with common-law husbands should be entitled to this treatment. The largest group (40 %) was formed by respondents of the opinion that artificial insemination should be available to all women regardless of their marital status or if they live with a partner or not.

Respondents’ opinions showed their prevailing conviction that “human relations in the Czech Republic are more bad than good”, compared with 41 % of respondents, who said that relations between people here are “definitely good” or “more good than bad”. The negative opinion was voiced by a total of 54 %, who described it as “more bad than good” or “definitely bad”.

The most significant change since 1992 occurred in the area of relation between parents and children - in 1992 there were only two percentage points more of those saying that these relations had got worse than those thinking they had become better.

The results of the Public Opinion Research Centre survey shows that 70 % of single women and 69 % of single men would like to get married in the future. 12 % of single women and 6 % of single men decided not to conclude a marriage in their future life. The most frequently named reasons for getting married were “children” (66 %) and the opinion that "two is better than one” (34 %), a quarter of respondents consider taking marriage vows to be “obvious and normal”.

In December 2003 Public Opinion Research Centre also included in its survey two open questions, where respondents named what they disliked most about human character and behaviour of people. The results of the survey show that as to the human character respondents dislike pretentiousness, lying and jealousy most, and with respect to the behaviour of people the first spots were occupied by pretentiousness, lying and aggressiveness.

The survey results confirmed that the upbringing of children was concentrated in the hands of women. About four fifths of respondents with children say for example that mother takes the child to the doctor’s or used to go to the doctor’s in case of the grown up child, as well as stays or used to stay with the child at home during illness. Mainly mothers read stories to their children and learn with them.