Religion
Reading these charts
When reading the charts in this publication:- solid bars have significant differences in time to at least one other group
- hatched bars have no significant difference to any other group
- missing bars mean that this value has been suppressed due to small numbers of responses for that breakdown
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1 Introduction
This section discusses how respondents of different religious groups spent their time in 2020. Respondents were asked: “What is your religion?”. Respondents who said they lived in Scotland were given the following options:
- No religion
- Church of Scotland
- Roman Catholic
- Other Christian
- Buddhist
- Hindu
- Jewish
- Muslim
- Sikh
- Any other religion, please describe (blank field)
- Prefer not to say
- Skip question
Due to a small number of responses for some of the options, responses were grouped in one of three categories: ‘Christian’, ‘other religion’, ‘no religion’.
those who selected options 2-4 were categorised as ‘Christian’ (584 diary days)
those who selected options 5-10 were categorised as ‘other religion’ (28 diary days)
those who selected option 1 were categorised as ‘no religion’ (468 diary days)
Those who selected options 11 and 12 were categorised as Unknown (20 diary days) and were removed from the analysis, as the category does not provide a meaningful and robust comparison between categories.
Small sample sizes can affect significance estimates. For this reason caution is advised when making comparisons between groups with a sample of fewer than 50. This is the case with the category of ‘other religions’ where there are fewer than 50 diary days, thus readers are advised to exercise care when interpreting the following results. Analysis looking only at those who participated in the activities was not possible for ‘other religions’, due to small sample size.
When interpreting the below findings it’s important to note that Christians tend to be older and, as a result, age may also play a role in a Christian respondent’s likelihood to do or not do an activity.
2 Activity type
No differences were found between religious groups for the overarching categories of free time, paid work, unpaid work, personal care.
3 Paid work
There were no differences between religious groups for paid work away from home or paid work from home.
4 Unpaid work
4.1 ‘Christian’ respondents spent longer on housework/cooking compared to non-religious respondents
Figure 1: A bar chart showing average time spent on unpaid work, Scotland, 2020
When unpaid work was broken down by categories, ‘Christian’ respondents were found to have spent longer on housework/cooking (on average 1 hour and 51 minutes per day) compared to those with no religion (1 hour and 27 minutes).
No differences were found between groups for developmental and non-developmental childcare, household management, other unpaid work, study, and travel.
5 Personal care
5.1 ‘Christian’ respondents spent longer on other personal care compared to those with no religion
Figure 2: A bar chart showing average time spent on personal care by religion, Scotland, 2020
‘Christian’ respondents spent longer (on average 2 hours and 30 minutes per day) on other personal care activities, which included activities such as eating and drinking, washing, getting ready, compared to respondents with no religion (2 hours and 3 minutes).
Groups did not differ in time spent on personal fitness, sleep, and total personal care.
6 Free time
Groups did not differ in their time spent on free time activities, such as leisure/social activities, other leisure activities, and other free time.
7 Did activity type
There were no differences between religious groups for free time, paid work, unpaid work, and personal care when looking at only those who did these activities.
8 Did paid work
When looking at only those who participated in paid work, groups did not differ on time spent working away from home, working from home, and total paid work.
9 Did unpaid work
9.1 Of those who participated in unpaid work, differences between religious groups were found in housework/cooking and non-developmental childcare
Figure 3: A bar chart showing average time spent on unpaid work by religion for those who participated in the activity, Scotland, 2020
When looking at those who participated in unpaid work, breakdowns by activity showed that ‘Christian’ respondents spent longer on housework/cooking (on average 2 hours and 13 minutes per day) compared to those with no religion (1 hour and 49 minutes).
Respondents with no religion spent longer on non-developmental childcare activities (1 hour and 54 minutes) compared to ‘Christian’ respondents (59 minutes).