Russian fans are proud of the Russian Olympic athletes’ victories. The decision to ban the Russian Paralympics team from competing at the Rio Paralympic Games is regarded as unfounded.

MOSCOW, August 18, 2016.  Russian Public Opinion Research Centre (VCIOM) presents the data of the survey describing whether Russians watch the 2016 Summer Olympic Games; who they support; what they think about the doping scandal involving the Russian Paralympic Team.

Russians are more and more interested in the Rio Olympics in the midst of the Games: 56% of Russians keep track of all or particular sport events (including 19% of those who watch all the sports). However compared to the Sochi Olympics (82%) and even the Vancouver Olympics (75%) these Summer Games are less popular.

According to the Medialogia research data, a total number of 230 thousand publications were found in the Russian media from January to August 2016. More than 90 thousand publications have been left in the Russian media since the beginning of the Olympic Games.

At the same time, the performance of the Russian athletes evokes stable positive feelings among Russian audience such as pride (53%), hope (37%), and respect (33%). Rarely respondents mention disappointment (6%) and shame (3%).

The athletics that was supposed to win the most medals before the start of the Olympics is ranked only fourth or fifth in the supporters’ rating of likes. As the survey data suggest, the leaders are swimming and other water sports as well as gymnastics and volleyball.

Russian society is divided in the opinion on whether the Russian authorities did their best to let the Russian athletes participate in the 2016 Summer Olympic Games amidst doping scandal: 46% say yes; 39% oppose them.

New doping scandal involving Russian Paralympics team (full ban on participation in the Olympic Games following the massive use of doping) is widely known: 64% of respondents heard about it. However, the accusations seem to be less true than the accusations against Russian track and field athletes. Two-thirds (63%) regard the allegations of the international organizations as political; a further 20% consider that the massive use of doping is common in many countries of the world, thus, the demand for the punishment of the Russian Paralympic athletes is not founded.

The VCIOM survey was carried out on August 13-14, 2016, in 130 settlements, 46 regions and 9 federal districts of Russia. Sample size for each survey was 1600 persons. The surveys were conducted with multi-stage stratified sample based on general rule of walking and quotas at the final selection stage; the sample is representative of the Russian population aged 18 and over according to sex, age, education, type of settlement.  The margin of error (taking into account the design effect) with 95% confidence interval does not exceed 3.5%. The survey method is community-based formalized face-to-face interviews. Apart from the margin of error, minor changes in question wording and different circumstances arising during the field work should be taken into account.

Russian media monitoring and analysis were carried out by the Medialogia Company using approximately 31 400 sources such as television, radio, newspapers, magazines. Period of study: January - August 2016.

* The question referred to the Sochi Olympics

* The question referred to track and field athletes 

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