Study title

Parish Employee Survey 2012

Dataset ID Number

FSD3580

Persistent identifier

urn:nbn:fi:fsd:T-FSD3580

Data Type

Quantitative

Authors

• Church Research Institute

Abstract

The 2012 church employee survey studied the views of people working in the parishes of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland. Main themes of the survey included the meaning of work, the future of parish work, structural changes and strategic planning in the parishes, equality, marriage, religiosity, and ethics.

First, the respondents were asked to consider what their work meant to them. Questions included, for example, whether the respondents worked mainly to guarantee their income or whether it was important to them to be able to help others in their work. Views on the future of the Evangelical Lutheran Church were surveyed with various statements on what the main focus of the church should be moving forward. The statements included, for example, whether the church should be more direct in discussing social issues, have a stronger stance on marriage and family matters, support immigrants more, and be more visible on online platforms. Structural changes and strategic planning in the parishes were examined with questions on whether the respondents' parish had gone through a merger, how the respondents thought parish structures should be developed, and whether there had been changes in personnel in their line of work and how the changes had affected their work environment. Further questions charted the effect of different church strategies and guidelines on work in the respondents' parish as well as how important the respondents thought the strategies and guidelines were in their own work activities.

Next, views on an addendum to the hymn book of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, which was being prepared at the time of the survey, were charted. The respondents' values were examined with questions on same-sex marriage, ethical decision-making in the church, and use of visible religious symbols. The respondents were also asked whether they thought they were more conservative or liberal within the church, how often they attended worship services, and how often they prayed.

Background variables included the respondent's age, gender, job title, how long they had worked for the church, size of their parish, diocese, municipality where they worked, and political party preference.

Keywords

church; equal opportunity; marriage; personnel; religiosity; religious beliefs; religious personnel; working conditions

Topic Classification

• Social sciences (Fields of Science Classification)
• Humanities (Fields of Science Classification)
• Working conditions (CESSDA Topic Classification)
• Religion and values (CESSDA Topic Classification)

Series

Parish Employee Surveys

Distributor

Finnish Social Science Data Archive

Access

The dataset is (B) available for research, teaching and study.

Data Collector

• Church Research Institute

Time Period Covered

2012

Collection Dates

2012-05-25 – 2012-06-14

Nation

Finland

Geographical Coverage

Finland

Analysis/Observation Unit Type

Individual

Universe

Employees aged over 18 working in the parishes of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland

Time Method

Cross-section

Sampling Procedure

Probability: Simple random

The survey was sent to a randomly drawn sample of church employees. 883 people responded to the survey.

Collection Mode

Self-administered questionnaire: Web-based (CAWI)

Research Instrument

Structured questionnaire

Data File Language

Downloaded data package may contain different language versions of the same files.

The data files of this dataset are available in the following languages: Finnish.

FSD translates quantitative data into English on request, free of charge. More information on ordering data translation.

Data Version

1.0

Completeness of Data and Restrictions

To prevent identification of respondents, the open-ended variable charting the respondents' opinions on the future of the church was removed from the data by the researcher. Additionally, variable q23 denoting job title was categorised, variable q25 denoting size of parish was top-coded, variable q21 denoting year of birth was top- and bottom-coded, and open-ended responses of the type "Other, please specify" to variables q2 and q23_1 were removed from the data at FSD.

Weighting

There are no weight variables in the data.

Citation Requirement

The data and its creators shall be cited in all publications and presentations for which the data have been used. The bibliographic citation may be in the form suggested by the archive or in the form required by the publication.

Bibliographical Citation

Church Research Institute: Parish Employee Survey 2012 [dataset]. Version 1.0 (2022-12-19). Finnish Social Science Data Archive [distributor]. https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:fsd:T-FSD3580

Deposit Requirement

Notify FSD of all publications where you have used the data by sending the citation information to user-services.fsd@tuni.fi.

Disclaimer

The original data creators and the archive bear no responsibility for any results or interpretations arising from the reuse of the data.

Related Publications

Haastettu kirkko. Suomen evankelis-luterilainen kirkko vuosina 2008-2011 (2012). Kirkon tutkimuskeskuksen julkaisuja 115. Tampere: Kirkon tutkimuskeskus