A new survey has revealed the world’s most ignorant
countries and ranked India at No.2.
The Perils of Perception survey showed that many people
didn’t know the basic factsabout issues such as inequality, immigration and
obesity and it looked at the demographics of each of the 33 countries invovled
and questioned people about them.
The survey, carried out by Ipsos MORI published its latest
results this week. The most ignorant country was Mexico, followed by India and
Brazil taking second and third place respectively. The table did show some
regional patterns, for example Latin American countries tended to be more
inaccurate while European countries tended to be more accurate.
However, New Zealand was the most inaccurate developed
country, which ranked in 5th place. Peru came in fourth, while Colombia,
Belgium, South Africa, Argentina and Italy took positions six to 10 on the
table. The results showed that those surveyed think that a quarter of people in
their countries were immigrants, when in reality, the figure was fewer than one
in 10.
Argentinians were the furthest from the truth, thinking 30
per cent of their population were immigrants, but it was only actually 5 per
cent. Globally, people thought that the richest 1 per cent own nearly half of
the wealth in their country. But the real figure is closer to a third. Brits
overestimated the proportion of wealth more than any other country, thinking 56
per cent own the most wealth, but the real figure is only 23 per cent.
When it came to age, as most nations are living for longer,
the general consensus for the average age was 50 years old. But Brazilians got
this very wrong. The average age in Brazil is 31, but they thought it was over
20 years higher at 56. Obesity was also another issue that people vastly underestimated.
On average, those surveyed thought that only 40 per cent of people were
overweight, but the actual figure is more than half at 54 per cent.
Britain in particular was slightly deluded about the
severity of our obesity problem, despite it being a major topical issue. When
asked how many people over 20 were classed as obese, those surveyed thought it
was 44 per cent, but it’s actually a very worrying 62 per cent. Bobby Duffy,
Managing director of Ipsos MORI Social Institute, said: “Each population gets a
lot wrong. We are often most incorrect on factors that are widely discussed in
the media or highlighted as challenges facing societies, such as the proportion
of young adults still living at home, immigration and wealth inequality.
“We know from previous studies that this is partly because
we over-estimate what we worry about – as well as worrying about the issues we
think are widespread.”
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