This paper discusses the methodological framework and initial findings of the World Survey of Friends 2024. In particular, it examines the challenges of producing a questionnaire that uses the language of faith in such a way as not to exclude people from a wide variety of religious traditions without becoming overly long and complex. The initial findings are quantitative, however, they are being supplemented with qualitative interviews to add a narrative element to the analysis.
Although there is a wealth of research and discussion of the history and development of Quaker practice through time, Daniels (2018) points out that sociological study of Quakerism has arisen only relatively recently, starting with three independent PhD theses in the UK in the mid-1990s. He list researchers who have published works of Quaker sociology over the last three decades but notes that it remains a less-studied field. Much of the work to date has been in the context of specific geographical areas (e.g. Kennedy’s 2016 work on Quakers in Ireland). Daniels observes that British Quakerism has been the primary focus, leaving the global majority unexamined in any systematic way. Quakers in Britain have been surveyed at intervals of approximately a decade (in 1990, 2003, 2013 and 2023). Each survey instrument has the same questions at its core, to allow comparison over time; in addition, the 2013 and 2023 surveys incorporated questions from other national surveys to extend comparisons to the wider population in Britain. The data collected by the British Quaker Survey (BQS) over the last thirty-five years gives a detailed snapshot of demographic information, beliefs and practices found in British Quakerism at each of the survey points.
Interest in carrying out similar research in other territories has increased over time. The Australian Quaker Survey (AQS) in 2014, based on the BQS 2013, was the first attempt to examine a complete national population of Quakers (Williams and Hampton, 2016). In addition, Western Yearly Meeting used BQS 2013 as the basis for a trial survey in the USA. This interest led to a plan for a pilot project to conduct a survey more widely. The total population of Quakers (about 400,000) live in 87 countries and use over 30 languages. A global survey of all Friends would be a very ambitious undertaking but, in conjunction with the BQS 2023, a project was set up to survey a more contained population: the 800 or so people expected to attend the 2024 World Plenary held by Friends World Committee for Consultation (FWCC). As well as restricting the population, that decision also simplified matters by reducing the number of languages involved to the three official languages of the World Plenary (English, Spanish and Kiswahili).
Religions are rarely considered on a global basis. The International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) has collected data on religion from 48 countries since 1991 but most analyses concentrate on a single geographical area or on cross-national attitudes to a specific social issue. The Pew Research Center has published datasets on religion from around the world since 2006. Most of the surveys concentrate on the plurality of religious belief and practice in a continent or sub-continent, with the notable exceptions of a survey of Pentecostals in ten countries (2006) and one of Muslims in 39 countries (2013). More recently, Ipsos carried out an online survey of people’s attitudes to religion and belief in 26 countries (2023). The religious diversity of the participants in the World Plenary (from 95 distinct Quaker groups, spread across six theological traditions) ranges from very liberal and post-Christian to strongly Bible- and Christo-centric. The common feature was that they had signed up to attend a regular international Quaker event where they would meet with people from diverse worshipping groups.
When designing the survey instrument, the project team had to tackle issues of wording the questions to cater for as great a range of understandings of belief and practice as possible. This paper presents the way in which the project team addressed the challenges of constructing a survey instrument suitable for a global audience with a wide diversity of belief. One example of this was to give the project a name that would be acceptable to all: in Australia and the UK, the survey is a ‘Quaker Survey’ but the global survey became a ‘Survey of Friends’ to reflect preferred usage in the evangelical tradition. In addition to the methodological challenges, this paper can share key initial findings from the survey. Williams and Hampton (2016) discussed the blunt tool that are quantitative results from this type of survey. Differing nuances and understandings of words in different religious traditions make evaluation difficult: people may mean the same thing but select separate answers and we cannot infer an individual’s rationale. This survey enables direct comparison of quantitative responses from Quakers across the globe; an important second stage is the use of qualitative interviews to enrich the statistical analysis with detailed accounts of individual experiences that add narrative and explanatory elements to the analysis.
References
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Daniels, C.W. (2018) ‘The Rise of Quaker Sociology’, Quaker Studies: An Overview. doi: 10.1163/9789004365070_006.
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Williams, P.G., and Hampton, J.M. (2016) ‘Results from the First National Survey of Quaker Belief and Practice in Australia and Comparison with the 2013 British Survey’, Quaker Studies, 21(1):95–119.
This paper discusses the methodological framework and initial findings of the first-ever World Survey of Friends in 2024, which was conducted among the participants of the World Plenary held by the Friends World Committee for Consultation in 2024. The survey was run by Woodbrooke's Centre for Research in Quaker Studies, which has a 35-year track record in surveying Quakers in Britain, and it gathered responses of Quakers from across the world and the breadth of theological traditions. In that context, this paper compares the challenges of constructing a new, global and multilingual survey with those of administering a well-established survey within a single territory. I argue that the quantitative approach to such a survey has academic value but that it can be significantly enhanced when combined with qualitative comments and interviews detailing individual experiences.