The Campaign Company specialises in social research and behaviour change. This is your guide to what we’ve been reading. Here’s what’s coming up this week:
Hello and welcome to the TCC Weekly – the Friday bulletin for people who know their Hanlon’s Razor from their Occam’s Razor.
Knowing that we can’t compete with this morning’s by-election results, we thought we would look at something completely different. So, in our Values Lab, we reflect on the rudeness or otherwise of wearing a hat indoors. We relate this to wider questions of propriety and ask how these influence the political debate.
And of course, there’s Charlie’s Attic, the part of the bulletin where decorum goes out the window. Today’s Attic includes an AI mock-up of Helen of Troy.
The Values Lab is based on the Values Modes segmentation tool – created by Cultural Dynamics and used by TCC– which divides the population into ethics-driven Pioneers, aspirational Prospectors, and threat-wary Settlers. Take the test here to see which you are.
Wearing hats indoors - is it proper?
Polling by YouGov earlier this month asked whether it’s rude to wear a hat indoors. The results generally find that it’s not rude, but drilling down into the data reveals some interesting breaks – particularly when it comes to politics (shown in the chart above) and age. Tories, Leave voters and older people are much more likely to take offence at a cap inside – with 52% of over-65s saying it’s rude, compared to 14% of 18-24 year olds. Other factors, by contrast – such as gender, social class and region – have almost no bearing on responses.
We thought we’d put this into the Values Lab, by testing the values attribute ‘Propriety’ – the statement for which is shown at the top of the chart below.
The findings show that this is overwhelmingly a Settler trait, garnering almost no agreement in the southern hemisphere of the map. This mirrors the sorts of breakdown you might get with statements relating to bigger topics, like Brexit or immigration.
When we think about terms like ‘tipping your hat’ or ‘doffing your cap’, the connotations are often deferential, based on tradition and the social order. Hence, we can see how a sentiment like the one for ‘propriety’ might overlay with wider fears – about a collapse in moral standards or a lack of respect among young people.
Those with a long memory may recall the issue of Sachs-Gate, during which Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross made an offensive prank call to the ageing actor Andrew Sachs. In an age before the culture wars had truly arrived on UK soil, the incident ignited a national debate, heavily split along generational lines – with older people tending to regard the calls as deeply improper but many younger people unable to see the big deal. Incidents like that illustrate how ideas about propriety, even on topics as trivial as wearing a hat indoors, can expose deep values rifts within society – including on much larger policy questions.
And finally Charlie’s Attic, the baseball cap we wear backwards each Friday:
Then take the test to find out how much you know about AI. And follow up with a review of what the electronic music world is saying about the technology.
