Federal Parliament Election 1984 (Panel 1980-1984)

Political attitudes and satisfaction. Behavior at the polls and party
inclination. Political self-classification.

Topics: first wave: judgement on the current and future situation in
the country; development of one´s own financial situation; interest in
politics; memory of political events in the last year; behavior at the
polls in the Federal Parliament election 1976; attitude to politicians,
state and democracy; party preference (ballot procedure, first and
second votes); certainty of one´s voting decision; orientation of
voting decision on politicians or a party; issue relevance and issue
competence of the parties; party inclination and party identification;
inclination to a party temporarily or in principle; reasons for or
against solidarity with a party (scales); sources of information for
forming a political opinion; frequency of watching television news
broadcasts; attitudes to NATO, nuclear energy, the environment,
government achievements, prosperity, leisure time and work (scale);
agreement of one´s own opinion with the goals of selected parties and
politicians (scale); confidence in the future; social concepts and
ideals; satisfaction with democracy; preference for federal chancellor
(Strauss or Schmidt); self-classification on a left-right continuum;
expected governing party or government coalition in the future; trust
in governmental and political institutions; preferred forms of
political participation; personal position in political controversies
(questions on foreigners, job security, government indebtedness,
foreign policy and price stability) and assumed positions of the
CDU/CSU as well as of the SPD; assessment of the general significance
of these controversies; interest in the election campaign and
significance of the election campaign for one´s own voting decision;
religiousness; self-assessment of social class; party inclination of
spouse as well as of father; union membership; occupation of father;
significance of religiousness in one´s own education.

Also encoded was: length of interview; size of place of residence.

Second wave: in the second wave the questions from the first wave were
largely repeated; beyond this the following additional questions were
posed: importance of areas of life; profile of characteristics for the
SPD, CDU/CSU, FDP and the Greens (semantic differential); satisfaction
with SPD/FDP coalition and the CDU/CSU opposition; behavior at the
polls in the Federal Parliament election 1980; personal time planning,
planning for the future and fatalistic basic position; evaluation of
the NATO two-track decision; preferred direction of development for the
economy, the environment, society and peace; preference for federal
chancellor (Kohl or Schmidt); classification of the parties on a
left-right continuum; attitude to nuclear energy; preference for a
neutral Germany, in order to make reunification possible; ties to
church; membership in clubs, organizations and citizen initiatives;
solidarity with the trade unions; expected personal further
development; characterization of occupational groups in one´s own
residential area; dominance of SPD or CDU constituency in one´s
residential area.

Also encoded was: length of interview; date of interview.

Third wave: in the third wave the following additional questions were
posed: opinion leadership and opinion allegiance in political
discussions; behavior at the polls in the Federal Parliament election
1983.

Also encoded was: date of interview; length of interview.