Authors

• Advisory Council for Youth Affairs (Nuora)
• Finnish Youth Research Society. Finnish Youth Research Network

Keywords

citizen participation, communities, political participation, satisfaction, social influence, social participation, voting, youth, youth culture

Abstract

The theme of the Finnish Youth Survey 2013 was participation, which was studied by investigating young people's voting behaviour, reasons for participation, belonging in communities and views on the possibilities of influencing decision-making.

First, the respondents' views on the importance of different principles, values and aspects of life (e.g. own health, leisure time, national security, human rights) were charted. Relating to civic engagement, the respondents were asked whether they had been involved in political activity in the previous 12 months, whether they had tried to influence issues important to them in the previous 12 months, which reasons had motivated them to act for a cause and which had dissuaded them from acting. Opinions were charted on the various ways of influencing decision-making and policies, whether the respondents themselves had used these ways to influence, whether they had voted in the previous municipal elections and if they had not, the importance of different reasons for not voting. The respondents were also asked how important certain reasons for not voting were to young people in general and what they thought their chances of influencing different things were (e.g. own economic well-being, EU decision-making).

The extent to which the respondents agreed with various statements relating to career and employment was investigated as well as opinions on how much responsibility different bodies and actors should hold for the well-being of Finns. Views on politics, voting and decision-making were studied by charting how much the respondents agreed with a number of statements. Finally, the respondents were asked to what extent they identified with different regions and areas, whether they used social media and how they used it, and whether they participated in the activities of a group or community in their leisure time.

Background variables included, among others, the respondent's gender, age, mother tongue, household composition, country of birth, nationality, identification with a minority group, education level, average grade of the latest report card, economic activity and occupational status, mother's education level and countries of birth of parents.