Saxonian longitudinal study - wave 33, 2022

The Saxonian longitudinal study is a social science longitudinal study. It was begun in 1987 and examines the change in political attitudes of young adults in the new federal states of the former East Germany. Since the 16th wave (2002), the topic of unemployment and health has been intensively studied. Another new focus is on questions of partnership and personality. The present study was conducted in 2022 and represents the 33st wave.<br>1. Political attitudes, life in the GDR: opinion on the unification of GDR and FRG; more dividing vs. more similarities between East Germans and West Germans; estimated number of years until East/West alignment, until East Germans and West Germans have grown together into a real community and until own income is 100% of income in the West; sense of threat from possible (renewed) own unemployment, possible (renewed) unemployment of partner and children, occurrence of personal hardship, increasing cost of living, own social decline, deterioration of health, poverty in old age, consequences of the Corona pandemic, consequences of the war in Ukraine, increasing immigration, expansion of international terrorism, increase in crime, consequences of climate change, increase in Islamist terror in Germany, and from increasing cost of rents; satisfaction in various areas (political system in the Federal Republic of Germany, current economic order, democracy, social policy, pension policy, family policy and labor market policy of the state, alignment of living conditions in the East with those in the West); confidence in the future for the respondent personally, for parents, for own children, for the development in East Germany, for the development in Germany as a whole and for the development of professional plans); satisfaction with the possibilities for political influence, with income, with social development, with one´s own state of health and with the chances of making it in life through achievement; left-right self-ranking; Party preference (Sunday question); assessment of life in the GDR; assessment of social development in East Germany since reunification as progress or regression; joy over German unification; socialism as a good idea that has so far been poorly executed; support for the goals of the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident (PEGIDA, LEGIDA); many West Germans treat East Germans as second-class Germans; secure future in East Germany; glad to have lived through the GDR; glad that the GDR no longer exists; not everything we learned about capitalism in school was wrong; often afraid of the Stasi in the time before the fall of the Wall; politically close ties with the Federal Republic of Germany; preference for a reformed, humanistic socialism instead of the current political order; East Germans should take to the streets again to draw attention to the situation in the East; the GDR was a state of injustice; it was high time that the SED regime was removed; goals of the ´Peaceful Revolution´ in the fall of 1989 are realized today; with the ´Peaceful Revolution´ in the fall of 1989, East Germans won freedom; capitalism is the best economic system that history has produced so far; attitudes towards foreigners in general; national pride; evaluation of personal experiences with the new social system; arrived in the Federal Republic; identity as a German, as a Saxon, as a European, as a citizen of the former GDR, as a citizen of the Federal Republic, as an East German, as a loser of German unification; assessment of the pace of reunification at the time; agreement with statements about society (I am lucky to be part of our society, I have influence on social development, feeling that I am taken seriously by politicians, I make a valuable contribution to our society, well integrated in the social environment outside the family, attachment to the region); most people don´t realize if lives are determined by conspiracies; there are secret organizations that have great influence on political decisions; politicians and other leaders are just puppets; whether you come from East or West Germany makes no difference nowadays; East Germans deserve more credit for the fact that the Wende was peaceful, people in East Germany were often treated unfairly after reunification; some things worked better in the GDR and should have been adopted; West Germany deserves more credit for financing reunification; West Germans still take little interest in East Germany; gender differentiation (no matter how successful a man may be, without a woman he is missing something very important; many women try to gain something under the guise of equality; in a disaster, women should be saved from men; most women interpret harmless remarks as misogynistic; women are too easily offended; you can´t be really happy in life until you have a partner; feminists want women to have more power than men; many women have a kind of honesty that few men have, women should be cared for and supported by men, most women don´t even see all that men do for them, women try to gain power by dominating men more and more, every man should have a woman he really loves, men are incomplete without women, women exaggerate problems in the workplace, once a woman has gotten a man around, then put him on a short leash, if women lose out to men in a fair competition, then discriminate, a woman should be carried on her hands by her man, many women enjoy playing with men, first seduce, then reject, compared to men, women have a better moral sense, a man should be willing to sacrifice his own well-being in order to provide for his wife, feminists make perfectly legitimate demands on men, compared to men, women have a finer sense of culture and better taste, women should give up work when there are children to take care of in the family, women today have the same opportunities in professional life as men, women are among the losers of German unification.

2. Unemployment: own unemployment since the fall of communism; frequency of unemployment overall; total duration of unemployment since the fall of communism in months; months of unemployment since March 2020; partner´s unemployment since the fall of communism; job security; worries about the job; short-time work due to the Corona pandemic.

3. Possibility and use of home office before COVID-19; frequency of home office use since COVID-19; possibility and use of home office since COVID-19; average hours worked per week in 2020, 2021, and 2022, respectively; average hours worked per week in home office in 2020, 2021, and 2022, respectively; attitude towards home office (promotes feeling of being alone, reduces stress at work, not compatible with childcare, I would like to work (partly) at home office even after the pandemic, I can work more productively at home, I am not in control of my workplace at home, my family/ partnership suffers from home office); satisfaction with personal home office situation; ERI Scale (due to high workload, high time pressure, frequent interruptions and disturbances at work, a lot of responsibility, frequent overtime, physically demanding work, more and more work over the last years, deserved recognition from supervisor, deserved recognition from colleagues, adequate support in difficult situations, unfair treatment at work); work pressure (easily pressed for time when working, already thinking about work problems when waking up, switching off from work is very easy, sacrifice for the job, sleeplessness when I postpone something I should actually do today); work experience (a lot of freedom at work, I can assert my ideas and wishes, I can implement ideas in the company, I actively contribute to the well-being of other people with my work, I feel that my work is meaningful, my work helps to make the world a little better, no one shifts responsibility to anyone else, even in tense situations, everyone pulls together, respectful interaction with each other in the company; I discuss private problems with my colleagues, I trust my colleagues completely, we often laugh in our team and have fun).

4. Attitudes towards Corona (COVID-19): Fear of contracting Corona virus; little control over contracting Corona virus; feeling I would not survive a Corona infection; feeling I would have to give up because of Corona; fear of infecting others with Corona; my family and friends are afraid they will contract Corona from me; Corona worries me; Corona is not much worse than the annual flu; the Corona crisis has been talked up so that a few can profit from it; the Corona pandemic is likely to have dire consequences for me and those around me; the Corona pandemic will permanently change our culture; the real background to the Corona illness will never come to light; attitude towards vaccination (full confidence in the safety of vaccinations (Confidence), vaccinations are unnecessary (Complacency), everyday stress keeps me from vaccinating (Constraints), careful weighing of benefits and risks (Calkulation), don´t need to get vaccinated if everyone is vaccinated (Collective Responsibility); COVID-19 disease detected with PCR test; vaccination against SARS-CoV-2.

5. Health: tendencies towards depression (in each case for years or only for a few months): often feel depressed and despondent, sometimes I no longer know what the meaning of my life is, am often at a loss, no longer understand the world, fear of the future; complaints in the last 12 months (nervousness, stomach ache, insomnia, heart complaints); assessment of own state of health; opinion on the influenceability of own state of health; suicidal thoughts; impairment in the last 7 days by: Abdominal pain or digestive discomfort; back pain; pain in arms, legs, or joints; headache; chest pain or shortness of breath; fatigue or feeling of lack of energy; and sleep disturbances; frequency of sleep problems in the past 4 weeks - Jenkins Sleep Scale (difficulty falling asleep, how many days woke up at night, how many days woke up and then had difficulty falling asleep again, how often felt exhausted and tired in the morning even though slept at night); sleep duration in hours on a normal workday and on weekends.

6. Personality: experiences (frequency): Arguments with other people that lead to conflict, no adequate reward for personal effort, experience that everything I have to do is too much, although I try, I do not fulfill my tasks as it should be, times when responsibility for others became a burden for me, I have to fulfill obligations that I inwardly reject, times when worries go over my head, times when I do not have the opportunity to talk things out with others, situations when I have to try hard to please others); SCL: Intensity of: Emotional outbursts to which one was powerless, feeling that it is hard to start something, feeling that I have to worry too much, vulnerability in emotional things, feeling watched by others or others talk about you, feeling tense or excited, feeling of heaviness in arms or legs, nervousness when alone, feeling of loneliness even in company, bodily experience (worry strongly spreads to the body, unusual bodily reactions quickly cause anxiety, often force myself to become calm, satisfied with sexual characteristics, satisfied with my own body, at home in my own body, I look at myself often and with pleasure, I know that others like to look at me, I often look in the mirror); life satisfaction; control beliefs (I am in control of my life, if I make an effort I will succeed, my life is largely determined by others, whether in my personal or professional life, my plans are often thwarted by fate); SVSS: Value orientations (freedom of choice, not taking risks, equal opportunities, people should admire one´s achievements, preserving traditional values and beliefs, standing up for the environment, people should follow instructions, varied employment, helping people, wealth, new experiences, obeying laws); openness to change (ideas for changing difficult situations, controlled reactions, evolving when dealing with difficult situations, actively seeking ways to compensate for losses in life); self-perception (confusion when thinking for oneself, danger when too close, problems making oneself understood to others, chaos of feelings, wrong assessment of how one´s own behavior affects others, feeling controlled or watched, fear caused by intense feelings, having been very hurt because deceived in a person, finding it difficult to make contact, not having good self-confidence, nasty surprises when trusting people too much); isolation tendencies (lack of company, feeling left out, feeling socially isolated); depressiveness: Frequency of complaints in the past two weeks (little interest in activities, dejection, melancholy or hopelessness, nervousness, anxiety or tension, not being able to stop or control worries).

Demography: sex; age; urban or rural living environment; current residence in East Germany, in West Germany, or abroad; lived temporarily in West Germany or abroad and returned to East Germany; occupational status; full-time or part-time job; part-time job; marital status; stable partnership; length of relationship with current partner; divorced; number of divorces; occupational status of partner; own children; number of children; number of own children in household; characterization of relationship with child; grandchildren; net personal income per month (grouped); net household income (grouped); amount of assets (grouped); household size; getting by on personal/family income; satisfaction with current living situation.

Additionally coded were: Respondent ID; willingness to be interviewed on topics of the study; fee waived in favor of the study; type of survey; participation in wave 33; worldview; GDR and FRG identification; unemployment grouped; EFA family relationships-strengths, weaknesses, and overall score (sum); KsT 5 social participation (mean); CMS -Conspirancy-Mentality Scale (sum); ASI Subscale of Benevolence (sum); ASI Subscale of Benevolence: Paternalism (sum); ASI Subscale of Benevolence: Complementary Gender Differentiation (sum); ASI Subscale of Benevolence: Intimate Heterosexuality (sum); ASI Subscale of Benevolence Hostility (sum); Happiness and Work Scale -Self-Actualization (sum); Happiness and Work Scale-Meaning (sum); Happiness and Work Scale-Community Professionalism (sum); Happiness and Work Scale - Community Familiarity (sum); Corona Anxiety (sum); Sense of Threat from Corona (sum); D-Score (sum); G-Score (sum); PHQ-SSS (sum); Jenkins Sleep Scale-Sleep Problems (sum); TICS-9 -Trier Chronic Stress Inventory (sum); SCL-9 sum score; FBeK 9-Insecurity/ Discomfort (mean); FBeK 9-Attractiveness/ Self-Confidence (mean); FBeK 9-Accentuation of the body/ Sensitivity (mean); IE-4 -Internal locus of control (mean); IE-4 -External locus of control (mean); SVSS - Openness to change (sum); SVSS - Conservation (sum); SVSS -Self-Transcendence (sum); SVSS - Self-Enhancement (sum); OPD-12 scale - Self-perception, OPD-12 scale - Relationship Model (sum); OPD-12 scale - Contact Shaping (sum); OPD-12 scale - Sum score; LS-S Loneliness (sum); PHD - Depressiveness (sum); PHQ - Anxiousness; ERI Effort Scale without question 5 (sum); ERI Effort Scale (sum); ERI Esteem Scale (sum); Overcommittment Scale (sum).