Today Russians are less interested in science than before. Most popular scientific areas for them are medicine and technologies.

MOSCOW, February 27, 2013. Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) presents the data describing whether Russians are interested in science; what scientific discoveries they are curious about; what scientists they know.

Over the recent six years the interest towards scientific and technological discoveries has considerably decreased (from 68% in 2007 to 47% in 2013). Simultaneously, the number of those who are not interested to know more about discoveries in science and technologies has increased (28% six years ago versus 49% currently). Those who are mainly interested in scientific and technological achievements are often (54%), active Internet users (57%), Russians with high level of income and high level of education  (53%, for each). Those who are indifferent are women (54%), persons who have low level of education (67%), low level of income (54%) and those who do not use the Internet (57%).

The most popular scientific areas are medicine (25%), technical discoveries (19%), and astronomy and space exploration (16%). This is followed by nanotechnologies and auto industry (7%, for each), physics and biology (6%, for each), Internet technologies and electronics (5%, for each), history (4%), chemistry and military developments (3%, for each). Least attractive areas are agriculture, architecture, construction and transport (1%, for each).

Jores Alferov and Sergey Kapitsa are the most famous Russian scientists of modern times  (5-8% in 2007-2013 and 3-6%, respectively). The third place is held by Andrey Sakharov and Grigory Perelman (2%, for each). Respondents also mentioned Korolev, Roshal, Fedorov and Vasserman, newcomer, ( 1%, for each group).

The initiative Russian opinion polls were conducted on February 2-3, 2013. 1600 respondents were interviewed at 138 sampling points in 46 regions of Russia. The margin of error does not exceed 3.4%.

Note: Using materials from the site www.wciom.ru or wciom.com, as well as distributed by VCIOM, the reference to the source (or hyperlink for the electronic media) is obligatory!