The findings coincide with World Kindness Day
A new survey has revealed that Scotland is the kindest part of the UK.
It shows that almost everyone views their community as a kind place (94%) and most reciprocate by helping people in their area who need it (88%).
The findings coincide with World Kindness Day which is being celebrated across the globe today (13th November).
Ipsos MORI’s research, commissioned by Carnegie UK Trust, is part of the trust’s new Quantifying Kindness report and commitment to exploring the extent to which communities are kind places and whether or not people experience kindness from each other and the services they use.
Researchers spoke to over 4,000 people across the UK to build up a picture of kindness for the UK as a whole and for the nations and regions.
Across the UK high life satisfaction is linked to strong experiences of community kindness: those who have strong experiences of community kindness are likely also to experience high levels of life satisfaction.
Within this positive picture, there are some differences in groups who are likely to strongly agree about kindness in their communities.
In Scotland, women are more likely than men to report strong experiences of kindness, those in rural areas are more likely to report community kindness than those in cities and there are stark differences between millennials and the rest of the adult population with 16-34 year olds reporting much lower views on community kindness.
For public services, the survey found that people generally perceive public services as kind (from 83% of public transport users to 91% of GP users). GPs and public libraries are seen as the kindest public services in Scotland.
Jennifer Wallace, head of policy at the Carnegie UK Trust, said: “Much is known at a psychological level about kindness as a relational concept and how it helps build a sense of belonging and contributes to wellbeing.
“Less is known about the extent to which our communities are kind places. This report presents the findings of the first, and largest, survey that explores this issue in depth.”
