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Background and introduction
In 2005, a working group on adult entertainment was set up by Scottish Ministers to review the scope and impact of adult entertainment activity. This reflected concern about the lack of controls on adult entertainment activity. Currently, the only licensing requirement on adult entertainment venues in Scotland is that they hold a license to sell alcohol, in the same way as a public house.
In recent years, there has been a noticeable expansion of adult entertainment facilities such as lap dancing venues, particularly in urban areas. Although a report commissioned by Glasgow City Council concluded that current licensing of adult entertainment venues is inadequate and that there is strong public lobby opposing such venues in the UK, 1 there is little systematic research regarding public opinion of adult entertainment across Scotland as a whole. Therefore, a module of 11 questions was commissioned in MORI's Social Policy Monitor to examine the public's attitudes towards adult entertainment, the use of these services, the perceived social impact of such activities and opinions on the licensing of adult entertainment venues.
The Social Policy Monitor is a multi-client survey carried out among a random sample of adults across Scotland. This wave of the Social Policy Monitor involved interviews with 1,015 adults. The adult entertainment section of the Social Policy Monitor was completed using computer-assisted self-interviewing, where respondents input their responses to survey questions directly into a hand-held computer rather than report them to an interviewer. This included an opt-out option for people who felt uncomfortable with the sensitive topic or did not feel confident using a computer. A total of 193 respondents opted out of this section. Of this group, almost two thirds (58%) were aged over 60 years, perhaps indicating that the majority of people who refused are likely to have done so because they were not willing to use the computer.
As a result, 822 of the 1,015 respondents completed this section of the questionnaire. The data were weighted to reflect the age and sex profile of the Scottish population and the geographical distribution across local authorities.
The questions in the adult entertainment module looked at issues relating to:
- general opinions of adult entertainment venues,
- the occurrence and frequency of visits to adult entertainment venues,
- attitudes towards the licensing of adult entertainment venues, and
- attitudes regarding who benefits from or is exploited by adult entertainment venues.
This report provides details of findings from these questions. Additional tables of data and a data file in SPSS format were also produced. Where percentages do not sum to 100%, this may be due to computer rounding, the exclusion of 'don't know' categories or multiple answers. Throughout the report, an asterisk (*) denotes any value of less than half of one per cent. Only statistically significant differences have been commented on.
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