In 2021, more than ** percent of the Thai population were Buddhists. This was followed by *** percent of Thais who were Muslim, and *** percent declared to be Christians. While Buddhism is prevalent all over the country, the Muslim community is primarily found in the southern provinces.

Abstract

The National Statistical Office carries out a population and housing census every 10 years, according to the United Nations’ recommendation. The 2010 census in Thailand was the eleventh population census and the fifth housing census of Thailand, and marked the 100th Anniversary of the Thailand Population Census Program.

The objectives of the census were: 1) To compile basic information on the population and housing characteristics such as gender, age, religion, nationality, education, marital status, work status, type of dwelling and so on. 2) To obtain basic statistics at sub-region level (Village, area). 3) To measure changes in the composition of population and housing during the past 10 years.

Geographic coverage

National

Analysis unit

• Household
• Individual
• Housing

Universe

The coverage of population and the residence where population actually live in are as follows. Population in coverage: - All Thais citizens residing in Thailand on the Census day (September 1, 2010); - Thais/Non-Thais who usually live in Thailand but temporarily be outside the country on the Census Day; - All military servants, defenses, civil servants, and Thai diplomats, including their families, of which their stations were outside of Thailand. - Non-Thais who residing in Thailand at least three months prior to the Census Day.

Population not covered: - Non-Thais military servants, defenses, civil servants, and diplomats, including their families, of which their stations were inside Thailand. - Non-Thais who live in Thailand less than three months prior to the Census Day. - Refugees or illegal migrants who live in the refugee camps.

Housing coverage: - All houses or dwellings where people live in such as private houses, buildings, public housing, rooms in office, domiciles under bridges, etc.

Kind of data

Census/enumeration data [cen]

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

In 2023, the number of Buddhist temples in Thailand reached approximately 43,500. This was a slight increase compared to the previous year. In that year, the northeastern region of the country had the highest number of Buddhist temples.

Thailand: Buddhists as percent of the total population: The latest value from 2013 is 94.7 percent, unchanged from 94.7 percent in 2012. In comparison, the world average is 36.4 percent, based on data from 21 countries. Historically, the average for Thailand from 1960 to 2013 is 94.5 percent. The minimum value, 94.3 percent, was reached in 1960 while the maximum of 94.7 percent was recorded in 2007.

In 2023, the number of Buddhist monks in Thailand reached nearly *******. This was an increase compared to the previous year. In that year, Bangkok was the leading province with the highest number of Buddhist monks in the country.

Thailand: Christians as percent of the total population: The latest value from 2013 is 0.6 percent, unchanged from 0.6 percent in 2012. In comparison, the world average is 51.1 percent, based on data from 145 countries. Historically, the average for Thailand from 1960 to 2013 is 0.6 percent. The minimum value, 0.5 percent, was reached in 1960 while the maximum of 0.6 percent was recorded in 1967.

Pew Research Center surveyed 13,122 adults across six countries in Asia about religious identity, beliefs, and practices, using nationally representative methods. Interviews were conducted face-to-face in Cambodia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. They were conducted on mobile phones in Malaysia and Singapore. Local interviewers administered the survey from June to September 2022, in eight languages.

This survey is part of the Pew-Templeton Global Religious Futures project, a broader effort by Pew Research Center to study religious change and its impact on societies around the world. The Center previously has conducted religion-focused surveys across sub-Saharan Africa; the Middle East-North Africa region and many countries with large Muslim populations; Latin America; Israel; Central and Eastern Europe; Western Europe; India; and the United States.

This survey includes three countries in which Buddhists make up a majority of the population (Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand); two countries with Muslim majorities (Malaysia and Indonesia); and one country that is religiously diverse, with no single group forming a majority (Singapore). We also are surveying five additional countries and territories in Asia, to be covered in a future report.

Pew Research Center has produced a supplemental syntax file containing SPSS code to generate common analytic variables in the survey's corresponding report and toplines. The ARDA has provided this syntax in a copyable PDF document as an additional download.

In 2023, the number of Buddhist novices in Thailand reached around ******. This was a decrease compared to the previous year. In that year, Chiang Mai was the leading province with the highest number of Buddhist novices in the country.

Financial overview and grant giving statistics of Thai Christian Fellowship

The annual report to Congress on international religious freedom – the International Religious Freedom Report – describes the status of religious freedom in every country. The report covers government policies violating religious belief and practices of groups, religious denominations and individuals, and U.S. policies to promote religious freedom around the world.

Financial overview and grant giving statistics of Wat Mongkolratanaram of Fl Thai Buddhist Temple Interbay Area Fl

In 2023, government expenditure on recreation, culture and religion in Thailand amounted to around 17 billion Thai baht. This was a slight decrease in expenditures compared to the previous year, which reached nearly 18 billion Thai baht.

In 2023, the northeastern region of Thailand had the highest number of Buddhist temples in Thailand, amounting to over ******. This was followed by the northern region, with a total of approximately ****** temples. In that same year, there were a total of around ****** Buddhist temples in Thailand.

In 2023, there were 27 Buddhist temples located on the island of Koh Samui in Thailand. There were ten churches on the island that year.

Regression model for distrust in foreigners in Thailand.

Thailand TH: School Enrollment: Primary: Private: % of Total Primary data was reported at 20.182 % in 2015. This records an increase from the previous number of 19.990 % for 2014. Thailand TH: School Enrollment: Primary: Private: % of Total Primary data is updated yearly, averaging 12.978 % from Dec 1971 (Median) to 2015, with 34 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 20.810 % in 2013 and a record low of 8.425 % in 1981. Thailand TH: School Enrollment: Primary: Private: % of Total Primary data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Thailand – Table TH.World Bank: Education Statistics. Private enrollment refers to pupils or students enrolled in institutions that are not operated by a public authority but controlled and managed, whether for profit or not, by a private body such as a nongovernmental organization, religious body, special interest group, foundation or business enterprise.; ; UNESCO Institute for Statistics; Weighted average; Each economy is classified based on the classification of World Bank Group's fiscal year 2018 (July 1, 2017-June 30, 2018).

Thailand TH: School Enrollment: Secondary: Private: % of Total Secondary data was reported at 10.481 % in 2015. This records a decrease from the previous number of 11.023 % for 2014. Thailand TH: School Enrollment: Secondary: Private: % of Total Secondary data is updated yearly, averaging 14.999 % from Dec 2001 (Median) to 2015, with 13 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 17.978 % in 2007 and a record low of 9.103 % in 2001. Thailand TH: School Enrollment: Secondary: Private: % of Total Secondary data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Thailand – Table TH.World Bank: Education Statistics. Private enrollment refers to pupils or students enrolled in institutions that are not operated by a public authority but controlled and managed, whether for profit or not, by a private body such as a nongovernmental organization, religious body, special interest group, foundation or business enterprise.; ; UNESCO Institute for Statistics; Weighted average; Each economy is classified based on the classification of World Bank Group's fiscal year 2018 (July 1, 2017-June 30, 2018).

The global population of Buddhists is projected to slightly increase up until the year 2030, at which point it will begin a gradual decline. In terms of its share of total world population, however, Buddhism has already seen a decline from over seven percent in 2010, with this being projected to decline further to close to five percent in 2050. This decline is related to Buddhism being popular in countries whose populations are in a natural decline, such as Japan or South Korea (and Thailand in the near future), as well as demographic developments in countries that have a policy of state atheism, such as China or Vietnam.While this decline in its traditional regions of influence in East and Southeast Asia will cause an aggregate fall in the number of Buddhists, there is likely to be some growth in other regions of the globe, such as Western European and North American countries, where the popularity of the ideas of Buddhism have grown in influence in recent decades.

Thailand has one of the world’s highest prevalence of cervical cancer, mainly caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV). HPV infections can successfully be prevented by vaccination, which is available at a cost but not yet implemented in the national vaccination program. Parents play a critical role in deciding whether to vaccinate their child against HPV. Thus, the aim was to examine the association between parents’ knowledge, beliefs, and acceptance of the HPV vaccination for their daughters, considering their socio-demographics and religious beliefs. A cross-sectional design was used among three schools in Thailand: Nakorn Phatom province (suburban) and Bangkok (urban). Parents of 9–12-year-old daughters completed the questionnaires, guided by the Health Belief Model. In total, 359 parents completed the questionnaires; of those, 301 were included in the final analyses. The ordinary least squares (OLS) regression analysis showed that background knowledge of HPV and the HPV vaccine was positively related to knowledge of HPV and cervical cancer. For beliefs, knowledge was positively associated with susceptibility (i.e., parents’ perceived risk of an HPV infection/ related disease), severity, and benefit. However, knowledge was not significantly related to barriers. For acceptance, higher susceptibility and benefit were related to higher acceptance, and greater knowledge was associated with higher acceptance. Thus, we found associations between parents’ knowledge, beliefs, and acceptance of the HPV vaccination for their daughters, considering their socio-demographics and religious beliefs. Parents, who reported religion as important, as opposed to those who did not, were more favorable toward the HPV vaccination. Four out of ten mothers had never undergone a cervical cancer screening, but most had accepted previous childhood vaccinations for their daughters. The overall acceptance of the vaccine was high, and we believe our results are promising for future implementation of the HPV vaccination in the national childhood vaccination program in Thailand.

Abstract

The World Values Survey (WVS) is an international research program devoted to the scientific and academic study of social, political, economic, religious and cultural values of people in the world. The project’s goal is to assess which impact values stability or change over time has on the social, political and economic development of countries and societies. The project grew out of the European Values Study and was started in 1981 by its Founder and first President (1981-2013) Professor Ronald Inglehart from the University of Michigan (USA) and his team, and since then has been operating in more than 120 world societies. The main research instrument of the project is a representative comparative social survey which is conducted globally every 5 years. Extensive geographical and thematic scope, free availability of survey data and project findings for broad public turned the WVS into one of the most authoritative and widely-used cross-national surveys in the social sciences. At the moment, WVS is the largest non-commercial cross-national empirical time-series investigation of human beliefs and values ever executed.

The project’s overall aim is to analyze people’s values, beliefs and norms in a comparative cross-national and over-time perspective. To reach this aim, project covers a broad scope of topics from the field of Sociology, Political Science, International Relations, Economics, Public Health, Demography, Anthropology, Social Psychology and etc. In addition, WVS is the only academic study which covers the whole scope of global variations, from very poor to very rich societies in all world’s main cultural zones.

The WVS combines two institutional components. From one side, WVS is a scientific program and social research infrastructure that explores people’s values and beliefs. At the same time, WVS comprises an international network of social scientists and researchers from 120 world countries and societies. All national teams and individual researchers involved into the implementation of the WVS constitute the community of Principal Investigators (PIs). All PIs are members of the WVS.

The WVS seeks to help scientists and policy makers understand changes in the beliefs, values and motivations of people throughout the world. Thousands of political scientists, sociologists, social psychologists, anthropologists and economists have used these data to analyze such topics as economic development, democratization, religion, gender equality, social capital, and subjective well-being. The WVS findings have proved to be valuable for policy makers seeking to build civil society and stable political institutions in developing countries. The WVS data is also frequently used by governments around the world, scholars, students, journalists and international organizations such as the World Bank, World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the United Nations Headquarters in New York (USA). The WVS data has been used in thousands of scholarly publications and the findings have been reported in leading media such as Time, Newsweek, The New York Times, The Economist, the World Development Report, the World Happiness Report and the UN Human Development Report.

The World Values Survey Association is governed by the Executive Committee, the Scientific Advisory Committee, and the General Assembly, under the terms of the Constitution.

Strategic goals for the 7th wave included:

Expansion of territorial coverage from 60 countries in WVS-6 to 80 in WVS-7; Deepening collaboration within the international development community; Deepening collaboration within NGOs, academic institutions and research foundations; Updating the WVS-7 questionnaire with new topics & items covering new social phenomena and emerging processes of value change; Expanding the 7th wave WVS with data useful for monitoring the SDGs; Expanding capacity and resources for survey fieldwork in developing countries. The 7th wave continued monitoring cultural values, attitudes and beliefs towards gender, family, and religion; attitudes and experience of poverty; education, health, and security; social tolerance and trust; attitudes towards multilateral institutions; cultural differences and similarities between regions and societies. In addition, the WVS-7 questionnaire has been elaborated with the inclusion of such new topics as the issues of justice, moral principles, corruption, accountability and risk, migration, national security and global governance.

For more information on the history of the WVSA, visit https://www.worldvaluessurvey.org/WVSContents.jsp ›Who we are › History of the WVSA.

Geographic coverage

Thailand.

The WVS has just completed wave 7 data that comprises 64 surveys conducted in 2017-2022. With 64 countries and societies around the world and more than 80,000 respondents, this is the latest resource made available for the research community.

The WVS-7 survey was launched in January 2017 with Bolivia becoming the first country to conduct WVS-7. In the course of 2017 and 2018, WVS-7 has been conducted in the USA, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Andorra, Greece, Serbia, Romania, Turkey, Russia, Germany, Thailand, Australia, Malaysia, Indonesia, China, Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan, Nigeria, Iraq and over dozen of other world countries. Geographic coverage has also been expanded to several new countries included into the WVS for the first time, such as Bolivia, Greece, Macao SAR, Maldives, Myanmar, Nicaragua, and Tajikistan.

Analysis unit

Household, Individual

Sampling procedure

The sample type preferable for using in the World Values Survey is a full probability sample of the population aged 18 years and older. A detailed description of the sampling methodology is provided in the country specific sample design documentation available for download from WVS.

A detailed description of the sampling methodology is provided in the Thailand 2018 sample design documentation available for download from WVS and also from the Downloads section of the metadata.

Mode of data collection

Paper Assisted Personal Interview [papi]

Research instrument

The survey was fielded in the following language(s): Thai. The questionnaire is available for download from the WVS website.