Nearly 364,000 foreign students with F-1 visas were newly enrolled at a U.S. college or university in 2016, double the number at the outset of the Great Recession, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement data obtained through a public records request. From 2008 to 2016, the number of […]

Since the end of World War II, there have been 225 successful coups (counting the events in Zimbabwe) in countries with populations greater than 500,000, according to the Center for Systemic Peace, which maintains extensive datasets on various forms of armed conflict and political violence. Most coups occurred during the height of the Cold War, from the 1960s through the 1980s.

Pew Research Center’s political typology sorts Americans into cohesive, like-minded groups based on their values and beliefs, as well as their partisan affiliation. Use this tool to compare the groups on key topics and their demographics.

In the next 20 years, Americans anticipate computer programs that diagnose and treat most diseases, fully automated stores and other technological advances.

The number of assaults against Muslims in the United States rose significantly between 2015 and 2016, easily surpassing the modern peak reached in 2001.

Most Indians hold a favorable opinion of Narendra Modi, and many are content with the state of the economy and the country's direction. The public is also satisfied with the way their democracy is working.

Americans’ concerns about prescription drug abuse have risen over the past four years, with some of largest increases coming among well-educated adults.

Read a Q&A with George Demacopolous, a professor of theology at Fordham University, to examine trends and issues in the Orthodox Christian world.

The latest census data, released last month, highlights how much commuting will be transformed for Australians in the years ahead. 

Two in three Australians who work, put in at least 35 hours per week (62%) and half of all couple families are two-income earning households (47.4%). Australians also spend longer in the education system, with one in three adults having attained a tertiary qualification, and more than one in five (22%) have a university degree.

However, most of the commuting to work and university relies on driving. Of the nine million daily commuters in Australia, 7 in 10 workers commute by private car (68.4%), which is half a million more than in 2011. Just 1 in 8 (12%) get to work by public transport, and 1 in 20 (4.7%) work from home.

Given the increase in car usage over the last half decade, it is unsurprising to see therefore that most Australian households have at least two cars (54.3%) which is higher than in 2011 (52.6%).

However, nationally the combined public transport infrastructure investment currently under construction is the biggest in Australia’s history and will clearly provide a massive uplift in commuting options in our capital cities. In addition to this, the decade ahead will bring autonomous vehicles, driverless shuttle busses, and electric share bike and scooter options which will help us journey “the last mile” from public transport hubs to our final destination.

The coming decade of transformed transport will facilitate behaviour change and provide our cities with a faster, cheaper, and less car-reliant future.

Most Americans say that NAFTA is good for the United States, and relatively few say that Mexico or Canada benefit more from the agreement than the U.S. does.

Summary

Focus groups
Focus groups are a really good directed conversation. You’ve gathered a group of people, whether they’re your customers or a group that a client is interested in reaching or understanding better then you go through a series of questions to explore their thoughts, their sentiment toward a brand, or their behaviors, actions. It’s basically a way to help a client listen. They can’t address any opinions. The client must be either behind the glass or watching the video. They just are learning. They’re putting themselves in a position to learn from this group.

Qualitative vs Quantitative Research
What’s the value when we’re approaching a project and we’re doing qualitative, versus the survey, the quantitative?

It’s a one two punch. The ideal project includes both, because oftentimes we want to finish with some “how many.” We want to know how many (quantitative) people think something, how many people are doing something, how many people would never do something. We want to finish with some numbers so that we know if we should try to serve them, if we should try to have resources for them, and make some decisions based on whether there’s enough people going in that direction.

The best place to get those options from is to learn from people through qualitative to see what are the full variety of things that people are doing, or that people are influenced by, or that people are motivated by, and to really get inside their heads a little bit. That, to me, is the value of qualitative.

What we learned from Bible readers
The Bible “feels” too long and reading it all “feels” like too much work.

People want permission to know where they can stop. It’s a big book. These are people who can read novels. They read all the time but, again and again, picking up the Bible is much more daunting.
If you’re helping some folks in your church, or someone you know, or your kids give them permission, give them start and stop places, help them know, “It’s OK. You’re not supposed to finish the whole thing today.” Or, “It’s not this race.”

Knowing where to stop or where to start and jump in, because the big idea was it’s overwhelming. If we think about it, there’s a lot of text in the Bible. There’s a ton in there. That became really clear to me.

The biggest way you can help either yourself or someone else start to create a habit is help them find five entry points, five core places, whether it be show them, “Hey, jump in the Gospels,” and help them know this is where they are. Talk through, “This is what’s going on here. You can always jump in here and you’re going to get this information.”

Be sure to Tweet your questions and comments to us: @LifeWayResearch and individually: @smcconn, @statsguycasey, and @lizettebeard. Join us next time for another edition of Keep Asking.

(See the full transcript for the episode –with links–on next page)

There were around 20.4 million U.S. veterans in 2016, representing less than 10% of the total U.S. adult population. Read key findings about U.S. veterans.

Sydney is Australia’s largest city with a population of more than 5.1 million. One in five Australians live in Sydney, and two-thirds of the population of NSW, our largest state, lives in this one city. 

Sydney’s population is growing through record annual births, life expectancy increases and through arrivals coming to the emerald city from other parts of Australia. Sydney remains the preeminent gateway to Australia and it is this overseas migration that is the biggest source of the city’s growth.

Sydney is Australia’s most culturally diverse capital with over two in five residents (43%) born overseas. Most Sydney siders (61%) have at least one parent born overseas and two in five (38%) speak a language other than English at home.

According the Australian Bureau of Statistics Census data, Sydney is comprised of people from over 220 countries and significant sub-regions, with over 240 different languages spoken and residents identifying with almost 300 different ancestries.

Based on the current growth trends, Sydney will reach 9 million by 2051. While there is much infrastructure under construction to respond to the current growth, the near doubling of the population in less than four decades will require much more.

So how can Sydney cope with this growth, and what will the future of Sydney be like? Watch Mark McCrindle comment on this story on 7 News

About Mark McCrindle

Mark McCrindle is an award-winning social researcher, best-selling author, TedX speaker and influential thought leader, and is regularly commissioned to deliver strategy and advice to the boards and executive committees of some of Australia’s leading organisations. Download Mark's full speakers pack here.

Today, 68% say the U.S. is less respected by other countries than it was in the past.

By Bob Smietana

NASHVILLE, Tenn.— In the fall of 1949, a little-known Baptist preacher launched a series of revival meetings at a “canvas cathedral” at the corner of Washington Boulevard and Hill Street in Los Angeles.

The meetings were supposed to last three weeks. Instead they continued for eight weeks, drawing more than 300,000 people and making Billy Graham a household name.

Nearly 70 years later, the 99-year-old Rev. Graham remains one of the best-known preachers in America, according to a survey from Nashville-based LifeWay Research.

Half of Protestant churchgoers in America (48 percent) have seen one of his sermons on television, while 1 in 10 (11 percent) attended one of his revivals, known as crusades.

If you go to a Protestant church, chances are you know of Billy Graham, said Scott McConnell, executive director of LifeWay Research.

“We’d be hard-pressed to find another American Christian leader who has that kind of name recognition,” said McConnell.

Multimedia ministry

The survey of 1,000 churchgoers—those who attend a Protestant or nondenominational church at least once a month—found Graham has had widespread influence.

Two-thirds of those surveyed had some contact with Graham’s ministry, according to LifeWay Research:

• 48 percent watched a Billy Graham sermon on television.
• 18 percent listened to one of his sermons on the radio.
• 15 percent read one of his books.
• 14 percent read a Billy Graham newspaper column.
• 11 percent attended a Billy Graham crusade.
• 8 percent watched a Billy Graham sermon online.

A third of churchgoers had not interacted with Graham’s ministry in person, in print or through television, radio or the internet. Four percent say they “have no idea who Billy Graham is.”

Churchgoers who are 18 to 34 (16 percent) are most likely not to know who Graham is. Only 1 percent of those 35 and older don’t know who he is.

Older churchgoers have the most interaction with Graham’s ministry. Three-quarters (74 percent) of Protestant churchgoers 65 and older have seen one of his sermons on television, as have 57 percent of those ages 50 to 64.

Nineteen percent of Protestant churchgoers 65 and older—and 14 percent of those 50 to 64—say they’ve been to a Graham crusade.

Baptist (14 percent) and nondenominational churchgoers (12 percent) are most likely to have gone to a Graham crusade. Lutherans (3 percent) are least likely.

“For several generations of Americans, Billy Graham had a powerful effect on their Christian faith,” said McConnell.

Bob Smietana is senior writer for Facts & Trends.

Methodology:
LifeWay Research conducted the study Aug. 22–30, 2017, using the web-enabled KnowledgePanel®, a probability-based panel designed to be representative of the U.S. population. Initially, participants are chosen scientifically by a random selection of telephone numbers and residential addresses. People in selected households are then invited by telephone or by mail to participate in the web-enabled KnowledgePanel®. For those who agree to participate but do not already have internet access, GfK provides at no cost a laptop and ISP connection.

For this survey, a nationally representative sample of U.S. Protestant and nondenominational adults (18 and older) who attend religious services once a month or more often was selected from the KnowledgePanel®.

Sample stratification and base weights were used for gender, age, race/ethnicity, region, metro/non-metro, home ownership, education and income to reflect the most recent U.S. Census data. Study-specific weights included for gender by age, race/ethnicity, region and education to reflect GSS 2016 data. The completed sample is 1,010 surveys. The sample provides 95 percent confidence that the sampling error does not exceed plus or minus 3.1 percent. Margins of error are higher in sub-groups.

LifeWay Research is a Nashville-based, evangelical research firm that specializes in surveys about faith in culture and matters that affect churches.

Download the research

Today, there are approximately 260 million Orthodox Christians in the world, accounting for 12% of the global Christian population. Read key takeaways about Orthodox Christians.

Concentrated in Europe, Orthodox Christians have declined as share of the global Christian population, from 20% in 1910 to 12% today. But the Ethiopian community is highly observant and growing.

While eight-in-ten Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say that whether someone is a man or a woman is determined by the sex they were assigned at birth, most Democrats and Democratic leaners (64%) take the opposite view and say a person’s gender can be different from the sex they were assigned at birth.

Surveys of foreign policy experts and the general public reveal a division between these two groups over the role of the people’s voice in governing, as well as on the consequences of Trump’s presidency.