German General Social Survey (ALLBUS) - Cumulation 1980-2023

Abstract

The German General Social Survey (ALLBUS/GGSS) is a biennial trend survey based on random samples of the German population. Established in 1980, its mission is to monitor attitudes, behavior, and social change in Germany. Each ALLBUS cross-sectional survey consists of one or two main question modules covering changing topics, a range of supplementary questions and a core module providing detailed demographic information. Additionally, data on the interview and the interviewers are provided as well. Key topics generally follow a 10-year replication cycle, many individual indicators and item batteries are replicated at shorter intervals. The ALLBUS/GGSS Cumulation assembles all the time series in the ALLBUS program, i.e., the data set contains data for all questions that have been asked in at least two of the 23 ALLBUS surveys conducted to date. ALLBUS/GGSScompact is the freely available ALLBUS scientific-use-file. For data protection reasons, the data on migration history, age, occupation, and income are only included in coarsened form starting with ALLBUS/GGSS 2023. Moreover, as of 2023, data allowing regional breakdowns other than the differentiation between East and West Germany can no longer be included this data set, i.e. only the regional data in the variable eastwest is continued after 2021. The ALLBUS/GGSS data set includes the full range of anonymized demographic data and additional regional variables. This data set is available subject to the conclusion of a personal user agreement.1.) Economy 2.) Politics 3.) Social inequality 4.) Ethnocentrism and minorities 5.) Family 6.) Lifestyle and personality 7.) Health 8.) Religion and world view 9.) Personal and collective values 10.) Social networks and social capital 11.) Deviant behavior and sanctions 12.) ALLBUS-Demography 13.) Technical data, paradata and data on the interviewer 14.) Geographical data 15.) Added value 1.) Economy: assessment of the present and future economic situation in Germany and in one´s own federal state, assessment of present and future personal economic situation. 2.) Politics: satisfaction with the federal and state government, with German democracy and with the performance of the German political system (political support); basic political attitudes: self-placement on left-right continuum, placement of political parties on a left-right-continuum, political interest, party inclination; voting intention (Sonntagsfrage), participation in last federal elections, recall of vote in last federal elections, party-sympathy-scales, likelihood of voting for different political parties; political participation: personal participation and willingness to participate in selected forms of protest and other political activities, norms for political participation; frequency of discussing politics with friends, acquaintances, strangers, and family; political issues: attitudes towards nuclear energy, the death penalty for terrorists, towards the privatization of publicly owned companies; support for less government interference in the economy, for stricter environmental protection measures, for harsher punishment of criminals, for making social security government´s top priority, for a redistribution of income in favor of the common people; for the view that immigrants are good for the economy, for access to abortion without legal limitations, for more global free trade; attitude towards expanding or cutting budgets for social services and defense, perceived position of the federal government in these matters; democracy scale; populism scale: members of parliament must only be bound to the will of the people, politicians talk too much and do too little, ordinary citizens would make better representatives than professional politicians, political compromise is a betrayal of principles, the people should make the important political decisions, the people agree on what needs to happen politically, politicians only care about the rich and powerful; political knowledge questions (party affiliation of top-level politicians, functioning of democratic institutions etc.); political efficacy: perception of individual influence on politics, gap between politicians and citizens, self-assuredness with regard to political group work, too much complexity in politics, perception of politicians´ closeness to constituents, participation in the vote as a civic duty; perceived strength of conflicts between social groups; confidence in public institutions and organizations; identification with various political entities: identification with own municipality, the federal state, the old Federal Republic or the GDR, unified Germany and the EU; attitudes relating to the process of German unification: attitude towards the demand for increased willingness to make sacrifices in the West and more patience in the East, unification is advantageous, for East and West respectively, future of the East depends on the willingness of eastern Germans to make an effort, strangeness of citizens in the other part of Germany, performance pressure in the new states, attitude towards dealing with the Stasi-past of individuals, evaluation of socialism as an idea; evaluation of administration services and assessment of treatment by the administration; national pride and right-wing extremism: pride in German institutions and German achievements, pride in being a German, extremism scale. 3.) Social inequality: fair share in standard of living, self-assessment of social class and classification on a top-bottom-scale, evaluation of personal occupational success, comparison with father´s position and personal occupational expectations for the future, attitudes towards the German economic system and evaluation of policies supporting the welfare state, assessment of access to education, perceived prerequisites for success in society, income differences as incentive to achieve, acceptance of social differences, evaluation of personal social security, attitudes towards different ideas of social justice. 4.) Ethnocentrism and minorities: attitude towards the influx of different groups of immigrants; perceived consequences of presence of foreigners in Germany, attitudes towards refugees, treatment of foreigners by the administration, ranking in terms of importance of different citizenship requirements; scale of attitudes towards foreigners and contacts with foreigners (split: guest-workers) within the family, at work, in the neighborhood or among friends; opinion on dual citizenship and on equal rights for foreigners, support for the teaching of Islam in public schools, estimation of proportion of foreigners in East and West Germany and in the neighborhood where respondent lives, living in neighborhoods with high percentage of foreigners, perceived differences in lifestyle, indicators for social distance to ethnic minorities and foreigners, attitudes towards Islam (Islamophobia), support for Islam as a school subject, support for the building of mosques in Germany, attitudes towards Jews (Antisemitism scale), perception and evaluation of discriminatory behavior towards foreigners. 5.) Family: attitude towards marriage and having a family, ideal number of children, attitude towards employment of women and mothers, attitude towards the role of men and women in the family, division of labor regarding house and family work, importance of educational goals, most important educational goals in school, classification of the importance of certain educational aspirations for a child, desired characteristics of children. 6.) Lifestyle and personality: authoritarianism, importance of life aspects, preferred job characteristics (security, income, responsibility, etc.), free time activities; internet use: frequency and type of device; use of media (frequency of watching television over the week, taste in television programs, frequency of watching the news on tv and of reading a daily newspaper per week, musical preferences), mobile phone ownership. 7.) Health: overall health, physical and psychological shape during the last four weeks, health problems’ impact on everyday life, chronic illnesses, been sick in the last four weeks, reason for and frequency of seeing a doctor in the last three months, time spent in hospital during the last 12 months, officially recognized disability level, smoking habits, overall life satisfaction, height and weight, consumption of various foodstuffs and beverages, affectedness by unhealthy working conditions and by mobbing, perception of general environmental pollution and personally experienced environmental pollution, questions on AIDS (knowledge of the disease AIDS, attitudes towards AIDS-infected people, worry about personal AIDS infection, personal protective measures and behavioral changes, AIDS-infected people in one´s own circle of friends). 8.) Religion and world view: present and former religious affiliation, frequency of church attendance, frequency of attending other place of worship, importance of religion in parental home, frequency of prayer, participation in religious activities, frequency of meditation, interest in Christian programs in the media, self-assessment of religiousness and spirituality, religious cosmology and belief in God, religious beliefs, meaning of life, religious indifference, thinking about metaphysical questions, experience with and attitude towards different forms of belief, parabelief and superstition, religion vs. science, funeral by church, marriage in church, importance of religion in raising own children, baptism of children, attitude towards person with different faiths marrying into the family. 9.) Personal and collective values: materialism/postmaterialism (importance of law and order, fighting rising prices, free expression of opinions and influence on governmental decisions), individual value orientations (Klages), attitudes towards legalizing abortion. 10.) Social networks and social capital: ego-centered networks (number of contacts in network, information on: gender, age, kinship or type of relationship, employment status, occupational position, voting behavior, citizenship, mutual familiarity between contacts), membership in trade unions, trade associations, clubs, political parties or other organizations; frequency of spending time with colleagues from work, club members or with friends; interpersonal trust, social pessimism and orientation towards the future (anomia), reciprocity. 11.) Deviant behavior and sanctions: fear of crime, personal victimization, moral assessment of different behaviors, desire to sanction different criminal acts, desire to make various behaviors illegal, self-reported deviant behavior (past and future), assessment of probability of being caught committing various crimes, respect of the law, believe in deterrence through punishment, purposes of punishment, assessment of sentencing practices. 12.) ALLBUS-Demography: Details about the respondent: gender, age, citizenship(s) (nationality), number of citizenships, present and former religious affiliation, currently at school or university, school education, vocational training, employment status, secondary job, details about current and former occupation respectively, details about first occupation, date of termination of full- or part-time employment, fear of unemployment or loss of business, industrial sector, affiliation to public service, fixed-term or permanent employment contract, length of commute, driver’s license, supervisory functions, length of employment, size of workplace, working hours per week (primary and secondary job), length of unemployment, gaps in occupational biography, desire for work, marital status, marital biography. Details about personal and household income: respondent’s personal income, principal source of livelihood, capital income, household income, per capita income, equivalized income (OECD-modified scale), types of income in household, number of sources of income in household, principal source of income. Details about respondent’s current spouse: cohabitation before marriage, age, citizenship(s), number of citizenships, original citizenship, religious affiliation, school education, vocational training, university degree, employment status, details about current and former occupation respectively, affiliation to public service, date of termination of full- or part-time employment, length of unemployment, fear of unemployment or loss of business. Details about respondent’s former spouse: age, religious affiliation, school education, vocational training, details about current and former occupation respectively. Details about respondent’s steady partner: length of relationship, common household, age, citizenship(s), number of citizenships, original citizenship, school education, vocational training, university degree, employment status, details about current and former occupation respectively, affiliation to public service, fear of unemployment or loss of business, date of termination of full- or part-time employment. Details about respondent’s parents: cohabitation with respondent as adolescent, age of respondent when leaving parental home, religious affiliation, school education, vocational training, university education, details about parents’ occupation. Description of household: size of household, number of persons older than 17 in household (reduced size of household). Details about household members: family relation to respondent, gender, age, marital status, income; for children of respondent or partner also: school education, university degree. Details about children: number of children, deceased children, desire to have children. Details about children not living in the household: number of children not living in the household, gender, age, school education, university degree, baptism, religious affiliation. Migration, residential biography and living environment: original citizenship of respondent, country of origin, country of origin of parents and of grandparents, migration between East and West Germany, distance to last place of residence, length of residence, self-description of place of residence, type of dwelling, size of dwelling, telephone in household, cat or dog in the household, environmental nuisances in area of residence. 13.) Technical data, paradata and data on the interviewer: Study number, digital object identifier, versioning, respondent ID, sample point ID (starting with ALLBUS 2023 not available in ALLBUS/GGSScompact), split halves, survey mode of the ALLBUS interview, number of attempts to contact the respondent, contact strategy, beginning and end of interview (date and time), length of interview, willingness to participate, taken part in how many interviews, participation in other surveys over the past year, reachability of respondent, presence of respondent at home during the last few weekdays, presence of other persons during interview (spouse, partner or children during, other relatives), interference of other persons in the course of the interview, willingness to cooperate and reliability of information from respondent, respondent followed interview on screen, breaks during completion of questionnaire (survey mode MAIL), percentage of completed questions, willingness to participate in an online survey, willingness to participate in other survey, details about respondent’s residential building and its neighborhood, perceived attractiveness of respondent; details about the interviewer (identification number, gender, age, school education, length of experience as an interviewer). 14.) Geographical data: region of interview (East / West Germany), Boustedt-type of municipality, percentage of non-German residents at county level; starting with 2023 only available in the ALLBUS/GGSS data set: federal state, BIK-type of municipality; only available as part of the Sensitive Regional Data (ZA5260): size of municipality. 15.) Added value: Body-Mass-Index, Inglehart-index; life forms (Schulz and Mikrozensus Typology), family situation (Schulz), type of household; International Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO) 1968, 1988 and 2008; occupational prestige (according to Treiman), Standard International Occupational Prestige Scale (SIOPS, according to Ganzeboom), International Socio-economic Index of Occupational Status (ISEI, according to Ganzeboom), magnitude prestige (according to Wegener), International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) 1997 and 2011, class position (according to Goldthorpe), European Socio-economic Groups (ESeG), per capita income, equivalized income (OECD-modified scale), transformation weight for analyses on household level or on individual level, east-west design weight.Die Allgemeine Bevölkerungsumfrage der Sozialwissenschaften (ALLBUS) ist eine Trenderhebung, in der seit 1980 alle zwei Jahre eine Zufallsstichprobe der deutschen Bevölkerung befragt wird. Das primäre Ziel des Umfrageprogramms ist die Beobachtung von Einstellungen, Verhalten und sozialen Wandel in Deutschland. Jede ALLBUS-Querschnittserhebung besteht aus ein oder zwei Schwerpunkt-modulen zu wechselnden Themen. Diese werden ergänzt durch weitere inhaltliche Fragen und ein Kernmodul mit detaillierten demografischen Informationen. Zudem werden Zusatzinformation zum Interview und den Interviewern bereitgestellt. Die Schwerpunktmodule folgen in der Regel einem 10-jährigen Replikationszyklus, viele Einzelindikatoren und Itembatterien werden aber auch in kürzeren Abständen repliziert. Die ALLBUS Kumulation 1980-2023 versammelt alle Zeitreihen aus dem ALLBUS-Frageprogramm, d.h. der Datensatz enthält Daten für alle Fragen, die in wenigstens zwei der bisher 23 ALLBUS-Umfragen erhoben wurden. ALLBUScompact ist der frei verfügbare ALLBUS Scientific-Use-File. Aus Gründen des Datenschutzes sind in diesem Datensatz die ab ALLBUS 2023 erhobenen Informationen zu den sozio-demographischen Merkmalen Alter, Herkunft, Beruf und Einkommen nur in reduzierter Detailtiefe enthalten. Als räumliches Merkmal steht ab dem Erhebungsjahr 2023 nur die Variable eastwest zur Verfügung, die es ermöglicht Fälle aus Ost- und Westdeutschland zu unterscheiden. Darüber hinaus sind ab Erhebungsjahr 2023 keine weiteren Daten zur regionalen Tiefengliederung enthalten. Die ALLBUS Vollversion enthält die vollständigen, anonymisierten demographischen Daten und zusätzliche Daten zu regionalen Merkmalen. Dieser Datensatz wird nach Abschluss eines Nutzungsver-trages bereitgestellt.1.) Wirtschaft 2.) Politik 3.) Soziale Ungleichheit 4.) Ethnozentrismus und Minoritäten 5.) Familie 6.) Lebensstil und Persönlichkeit 7.) Gesundheit 8.) Religion und Weltanschauung 9.) Wertorientierungen 10.) Soziale Netzwerke und soziales Kapital 11.) Abweichendes Verhalten und Sanktion 12.) ALLBUS-Demographie 13.) Technische Daten, Para- und Interviewerdaten 14.) Regionaldaten 15.) Ergänzungen und abgeleitete Variablen 1.) Wirtschaft: Wahrnehmung der eigenen Wirtschaftslage und der aktuellen und zukünftigen Wirt-schaftslage in der Bundesrepublik und im eigenen Bundesland. 2.) Politik: Zufriedenheit mit der Bundesregierung, der Landesregierung, der deutschen Demokratie und mit dem Funktionieren des politischen Systems; Fragen zu politischen Einstellungen: Selbsteinstufung und Einstufung politischer Parteien auf einem Links-Rechts-Kontinuum, politisches Interesse, Parteineigung; Wahlabsicht (Sonntagsfrage), Wahlberechtigung, Wahlbeteiligung an der letzten Bundestagswahl, Wahlrückerinnerungsfrage, Sympathie-Skalometer für diverse Parteien; Wahrscheinlichkeit, diverse Parteien zu wählen; Politische Partizipation: Eigene Teilnahme bzw. Beteiligungsbereitschaft an ausgewählten Protest-formen, Normen für politische Partizipation, Häufigkeit von Politikgesprächen mit Familie, Freunden, Bekannten, und Fremden; Politische Sachfragen: Einstellungen zu Kernenergie, Todesstrafe für Terroristen, Privatisierung öf-fentlicher Betriebe, Freigabe von Abtreibung, Eingriffe der Politik in die Wirtschaft, Umweltschutz, härtere Bestrafung von Straftätern, Wichtigkeit sozialer Sicherung, Umverteilung von Einkommen, positive Auswirkungen von Einwanderern auf die Wirtschaft, Freihandel; Haltung zur Ausweitung oder Kürzung von Sozialleistungen, Einstellung zu einer Kürzung des Verteidigungsetats und perzipierte Haltung der Bundesregierung in solchen Fragen; Demokratieverständnis; Populismusskala: Abgeordnete nur dem Volk verpflichtet, Politiker reden zu viel und handeln zu wenig, einfache Bürger sind bessere Volksvertreter, politischer Kompromiss ist Verrat von Prinzipien, Volk sollte politische Entscheidungen treffen, Volk ist sich einig was politisch passieren muss, Politiker vertreten nur die Reichen; Politisches Wissensquiz (Parteizugehörigkeit von Spitzenpolitikern, Aufgabe und Funktion von Institu-tionen usw.); Politische Selbstwirksamkeit: Wahrnehmung von Einflussmöglichkeiten auf die Politik, bürgerferne Politiker, Selbstvertrauen in Bezug auf politische Gruppenarbeit, Befähigung der Mehrheit zu politi-scher Arbeit, zu viel Komplexität in der Politik, Bürgerorientierung Politiker; Perzipierte Stärke von Konflikten zwischen gesellschaftlichen Gruppen; Vertrauen in diverse Behörden und Institutionen; Nationale und regionale Verbundenheit: Verbundenheit mit der eigenen Gemeinde, mit dem Bundes-land, mit der alten Bundesrepublik bzw. mit der DDR, mit Gesamtdeutschland sowie mit der EU; Einstellungen zur Wiedervereinigung: Einstellung zur Forderung nach mehr Opferbereitschaft im Westen und mehr Geduld im Osten, Wiedervereinigung ist vorteilhaft für Westen bzw. Osten, Zukunft im Osten hängt von Leistungsbereitschaft der Ostdeutschen ab, wechselseitige Fremdheit der Bürger, Leistungsdruck in den neuen Bundesländern, Einstellung zum Umgang mit individueller Stasi-Vergangenheit, Ei