Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner. Background and Objectives In October 1993, British Market Research Bureau International (BMRB) was commissioned to conduct a study for MAFF amongst the vegetarian population of Great Britain. This research was required to recruit a representative sample of 400 vegetarians and investigate their overall diet and intake of certain dietary components. The key objectives were as follows: To obtain accurate and detailed consumption data by coding in such a way as to allow extraction of mean and extreme consumption of individual foods. To identify vegetarians who are consumers of pulses, nuts, legumes, vegetables and fruit. To provide information on the age, gender, social class and regional profile of vegetarians. Participants in the survey were asked to answer a questionnaire about their dietary habits, including reasons for becoming vegetarian, dietary changes since becoming vegetarian and consumption and purchasing habits for different fruits and vegetables. They were then asked to keep a seven day weighed record of their food consumption. This involved weighing and recording in detail everything they ate and drank for seven days in a specially designed diary. On collection of the diary, a further interview was conducted which recorded details on the usage of mineral waters, dietary supplements, alternative protein sources and herbal teas. Main Topics: The dataset contains : (i) the seven day detailed record of the food and drink consumption in electronic format. The foods consumed during the survey have each been assigned an individual food code; names/descriptions are included. (ii) table (in an MS Access database and an alternative text form) of the questionnaire data together with coding frame information on most fields. Standard Measures The Social Class system of classifying households according to information on education history, occupational type and employment responsibilities of the chief income earner or head of the household - in this case the chief income earner was used, defined as the household member with the largest income, whether from employment, pensions, state benefits, investments or any other source. Social Class was used in order to provide discrimination between the type of respondents/ households which took part in the survey. Social Class is a system which produces one of six outcomes depending on the respondent interviewed - these are the well known A, B, C1, C2, D and E gradings. To summarise each group: A = Professional people, very senior management in business or commerce, or top-level civil servants. B = Middle management executives in large organisations, principal officers in local government and the civil service, top management or owners of small business concerns, educational and service establishments. C1 = Junior management, owners of small establishments, and all others in non-manual positions. C2 = All skilled manual workers, and those manual workers with responsibility for other people. D = All semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers, and apprentices and trainees to skilled workers. E = All those entirely dependent on the state long-term, through sickness, unemployment, old age, or other reasons, and all unemployed for over six months. N.B. Where an individual is retired, and/or the chief income earner is no longer alive, the occupation prior to retirement is used for social grading. BMRB use random location sampling. A representative sample of Enumeration Districts (ED) is selected at random after stratification by ITV region and ACORN type. Each interviewer working on a survey (in this case BMRB's weekly 'omnibus' survey within GB) is assigned one ED and is only allowed to call at the addresses included in the list of streets issued. Beyond that, quotas are set on the number of people of different types who may be interviewed. The quota controls used reflect the likelihood of people being at home, i.e. working status, presence of children, and age and gender are also used. Face-to-face interview Diaries Physical measurements
These data were generated as part of an ESRC-funded PhD studentship exploring the understandings and everyday lived experiences of 'faith vegans' in the UK, as well as the intersection between veganism and religion, specifically Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. In order to unravel the phenomenon of 'faith veganism' that was coined in this research project, the researcher recruited 36 UK-based faith vegans (12 Muslim vegans, 12 Jewish vegans, and 12 Christian vegans) and conducted multi-modal qualitative methods, comprising interviews, diary methods, and virtual participant observation. The interview transcripts folder includes the interviews with faith vegans (n=36), as well as a document listing answers to a follow up question that I sent to Muslim participants after the interviews (n=1), the diary transcripts folder includes both the diary entries that were submitted as part of the social media-based diary groups (n=8) and the diary entries that were submitted separately and privately (n=6), and the VPO field notes folder includes the field notes from the virtual participant observation calls (n=6).'Faith Veganism: How the Ethics, Values, and Principles of UK-Based Muslim, Jewish, and Christian Vegans Reshape Veganism and Religiosity' was a four-year PhD project (March 2020 - April 2024) funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ES/P000673/1). Veganism, a philosophy and practice constituting the eschewal of all animal-derived products and forms of animal exploitation, has grown exponentially in the UK over the past decade, including among individuals of faith. This phenomenon has been increasingly studied within social science, but there is one area that is noticeably absent in existing scholarship: how religion intersects with veganism. Given the perceived centrality of animal bodies to Abrahamic religious observance, coupled with potential ethical similarities between veganism and religion as possible guiding forces in an individual’s life, this intersection is pertinent to study. I asked, how are Muslim, Jewish, and Christian vegans reshaping and redefining veganism and religiosity in late modern Great Britain? I recruited 36 UK-based vegans identifying as either Muslim, Jewish, or Christian, and conducted a multi-modal qualitative methods study in 2021, comprising interviews, diary methods, and virtual participant observation. I then thematically analysed the data, drawing on theories relating to Bourdieusian sociology, reflexive religiosity, and embodied ethics and values. This research revealed that religion and veganism are often mutually constituted, with veganism being understood by faith vegans as an ethical lifestyle that may be incorporated into their religious lifestyles. Religious ethics, values, and principles are reflexively interrogated, enabling participants to bring together faith and veganism. However, for many, religion is non-negotiable, so specific knowledge and support is sought to aid the negotiations that take place around religious practice. Through reflexive religiosity, religious practice becomes veganised, whilst veganism becomes faith based. I developed a series of concepts that help explain the characteristics of faith veganism, such as faith vegan identity, faith vegan community, faith vegan ethics, and faith vegan stewardship, as well as contribute new ways of theorising veganism: as transformative, mobile, reflexive, and more-than-political. Thus, this empirical study offers a new understanding of veganism, one that intersects with and is underpinned by religion, and which I have termed faith veganism. I conducted a multi-modal qualitative methods study, comprising semi-structured interviews which were conducted over Zoom or Microsoft Teams, social media-based diary methods, using a closed Facebook group and private WhatsApp groups, and virtual participant observation using either Zoom, Microsoft Teams or WhatsApp video calls.
https://www.ceu.ox.ac.uk/research/epic-oxford-1/data-access-sharing-and-collaborationhttps://www.ceu.ox.ac.uk/research/epic-oxford-1/data-access-sharing-and-collaboration
EPIC-Oxford is the Oxford component of the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC), a large multi-centre cohort study with participants enrolled from 10 European countries. The EPIC-Oxford study began in the 1990s and follows the health of 65,000 men and women living throughout the UK, many of whom are vegetarian. The main objective of EPIC Oxford is to examine how diet influences the risk of cancer, particularly for the most common types of cancer in Britain, as well as the risks of other chronic diseases.
EPIC-Europe was initiated in 1992. It involves over 500,000 people from 23 centres in 10 European countries. It is coordinated by the World Health Organization International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, and supported by the European Union and national funding agencies.
EPIC-Oxford is one of two EPIC cohorts in the UK, the other is EPIC-Norfolk.
For further details on the study design, recruitment, data collection and other aspects of the EPIC-Oxford study, please visit https://www.ceu.ox.ac.uk/research/epic-oxford-1
This dataset compromises 15 semi-structured interviews conducted in 2024 with UK-based consumers of a range of dietary practices (including self-defined vegans, vegetarians, pescetarians, flexitarians and meat-eaters) who regularly eat meat substitute products. These are plant-based food products that closely imitate meat (for example vegan or vegetarian burgers, sausages, mince). Most interviews were conducted online and were one-to-one interviews, although one is a household interview at the participants' request. The data was collected for a project called 'Meat Free Mondays', exploring the practices, perceptions and motivations of consumers of meat substitute products, with the following objectives: (1) To understand the practices, perceptions and motivations of regular consumers of meat substitute products and (2) To identify barriers to consuming plant-based substitute products and consider how the research findings might help encourage more sustainable consumption practices amongst a wider population.
Not seeing a result you expected?
Learn how you can add new datasets to our index.
Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner. Background and Objectives In October 1993, British Market Research Bureau International (BMRB) was commissioned to conduct a study for MAFF amongst the vegetarian population of Great Britain. This research was required to recruit a representative sample of 400 vegetarians and investigate their overall diet and intake of certain dietary components. The key objectives were as follows: To obtain accurate and detailed consumption data by coding in such a way as to allow extraction of mean and extreme consumption of individual foods. To identify vegetarians who are consumers of pulses, nuts, legumes, vegetables and fruit. To provide information on the age, gender, social class and regional profile of vegetarians. Participants in the survey were asked to answer a questionnaire about their dietary habits, including reasons for becoming vegetarian, dietary changes since becoming vegetarian and consumption and purchasing habits for different fruits and vegetables. They were then asked to keep a seven day weighed record of their food consumption. This involved weighing and recording in detail everything they ate and drank for seven days in a specially designed diary. On collection of the diary, a further interview was conducted which recorded details on the usage of mineral waters, dietary supplements, alternative protein sources and herbal teas. Main Topics: The dataset contains : (i) the seven day detailed record of the food and drink consumption in electronic format. The foods consumed during the survey have each been assigned an individual food code; names/descriptions are included. (ii) table (in an MS Access database and an alternative text form) of the questionnaire data together with coding frame information on most fields. Standard Measures The Social Class system of classifying households according to information on education history, occupational type and employment responsibilities of the chief income earner or head of the household - in this case the chief income earner was used, defined as the household member with the largest income, whether from employment, pensions, state benefits, investments or any other source. Social Class was used in order to provide discrimination between the type of respondents/ households which took part in the survey. Social Class is a system which produces one of six outcomes depending on the respondent interviewed - these are the well known A, B, C1, C2, D and E gradings. To summarise each group: A = Professional people, very senior management in business or commerce, or top-level civil servants. B = Middle management executives in large organisations, principal officers in local government and the civil service, top management or owners of small business concerns, educational and service establishments. C1 = Junior management, owners of small establishments, and all others in non-manual positions. C2 = All skilled manual workers, and those manual workers with responsibility for other people. D = All semi-skilled and unskilled manual workers, and apprentices and trainees to skilled workers. E = All those entirely dependent on the state long-term, through sickness, unemployment, old age, or other reasons, and all unemployed for over six months. N.B. Where an individual is retired, and/or the chief income earner is no longer alive, the occupation prior to retirement is used for social grading. BMRB use random location sampling. A representative sample of Enumeration Districts (ED) is selected at random after stratification by ITV region and ACORN type. Each interviewer working on a survey (in this case BMRB's weekly 'omnibus' survey within GB) is assigned one ED and is only allowed to call at the addresses included in the list of streets issued. Beyond that, quotas are set on the number of people of different types who may be interviewed. The quota controls used reflect the likelihood of people being at home, i.e. working status, presence of children, and age and gender are also used. Face-to-face interview Diaries Physical measurements