2020 was quite rich in significant events for our country and the world. The year started with the COVID-19 pandemic and economic difficulties, ended with the liberation of our lands occupied by Armenia after 27 years. Moreover, a number of important events were recorded during the year at the political, economic and social levels. The parliamentary elections were held in February, the dismissal of many officials at various times for misconduct, governance reforms in the country and social assistance packages to mitigate the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic a few of these events.
As every year, a number of reputable opinion centers and survey companies around the world are studying how 2020 is for people at the local and global levels. Based on this, the Social Research Center conducted a survey among the population on December 27-29, taking into account the local characteristics of the current survey.
The survey was conducted among the population of Baku, Absheron and 7 economic regions (Ganja-Gazakh, Sheki-Zagatala, Lankaran, Guba-Khachmaz, Aran, Mountainous Shirvan, Upper Karabakh).
1050 randomly selected respondents took part in the survey.
The results
• The most memorable events in the personal lives of respondents in 2020 were the victory in the war (17%), coronavirus infection (15.7%) and the loss of a close family member (10%). 9.3% said there were no special events in their personal lives this year.
• In 2020, the most memorable events were the 44 day Patriotic War (86%) and the COVID-19 Pandemic (28%), which are rather understandable.
• While the current year was successful to varying degrees (70.2%) for two-thirds of the population , it failed for the remaining 29.8%.
• 67.4% of respondents are more or less satisfied with their lives in 2020.
• About one in four people has not been able to implement any of their plans for 2020. Only 43.5% of respondents were able to implement either all or some of their plans.
• 77.2% of respondents believe that 2021 will be better than 2020.
• Approximately 38.8% of respondent believe that the world will return to its pre-pandemic situation by April-June at the latest. However, a significant number of respondents (29.4%) had difficulty answering the question.
• The population is divided into two poles on what form of education will be conducted next year. If 31% think that teaching will be completely online, 29.2% think the opposite (face-to-face).
• There is no equivocal opinion among the respondents on the quality of virtual education. There is a difference of about 10% between the weight of those who are satisfied and dissatisfied. The worrying point is that about 7% of pupils or students cannot access to virtual learning.
• While a relatively large proportion of respondents (54%) were satisfied to some extent with the quality of the Internet in 2020, 36.7% were dissatisfied. Almost one in ten respondents do not use the Internet regularly.
• Although a certain proportion of respondents (40.5%) said they would be vaccinated, a remarkable proportion (29.5%) took the opposite view. 30.5% of respondents are indecisive. More than of respondents over the age of 65 intend to be vaccinated. A similar figure was 44% and 48% for the 46-55 and 56-65 age groups, respectively. The desire to be vaccinated is more common among men than women.
• Two main and some interrelated reasons for the negative attitude towards vaccination have been identified. Thus, 507% of respondents said they would not vaccinate because they were afraid of the side effects of the vaccine and 41.7% said they did not trust its quality.