A recently published dataset with about 24,000 completed face-to-face interviews has just been made available through the Middle Eastern Values Study, a project led by START affiliated researcher Mansoor Moaddel.
A "Comparative Cross-National Study of Religious Fundamentalism, Developmental Idealism, Values, and Morality” project consists of cross-nationally comparable nationally representative sample data collected in eight countries in the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia. These are Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, and Turkey. The surveys in Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia were carried out in 2011, in Tunisia and Turkey in 2013, and in Jordan in 2016. Altogether, this dataset consists of about.
The questionnaire used in this project consists of more than 250 items and covers the following topics:
- Religious Fundamentalism—attitudinal measures of religious fundamentalism are constructed and extensively tested, which are applicable to both Christian and Muslim (Shia and Sunni) fundamentalism, are available for the entire eight countries.
- Cultural Values—measures of attitudes toward gender relations, form of government, secular politics, morality, religiosity, national identity and pride, and other values are included for the entire eight countries.
- Sources of News Information—measures of the sources of information that the respondents rely on, including radio, TV, newspapers, the Internet, mobile phone, and so forth are available for the entire eight countries.
- Developmental Idealism—measures of the type of change respondents’ associate with Westernization and the type of change they associate with development are available for only the five surveys carried out in 2011-2012: Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia. For more information on developmental idealism project, see https://developmentalidealism.org/.
- Political Engagement—measures of political engagement are available for Jordan, Tunisia, and Turkey. For other countries, there are a few questions on this topic.
- Attitudes toward Violence—several items measuring attitudes toward political violence and suicide terrorism against Americans, Europeans, and people from the respondents’ country included in the eight-country survey.
- Demographics—Data on gender, age, marital status, area of residence, ethnicity, income, education, employment status and occupation, and self-described social class are available for all the countries.
The project is funded by the Office of Naval Research, Jack Shank Research Award, MITRE, Max Plank Institute, Eastern Michigan University and the University of Michigan. It is led by Moaddel (Principal Investigator), Arland Thornton (Co-PI), Stuart Karabenick (Consultant), Linda Young-DeMarco (Project Manager), Zeina Mneimneh (Project Manager) and Julie de Jong (Research Associate).