Full Subtitle: From Dollars to Donuts – Canada’s Premier Pollsters Reveal What Canadians Think and Why
Stars: *****
HarperCollins Canada (2009)
Nonfiction
282 pages
Summary: Bricker and Wright (of Ipsos Reid Research Company) share the insights they’ve found from thousands of polls and unlikely people they’ve met. Their latest book is filled with fascinating facts about Canadians from every province and territory, of all ages and income brackets. Also featuring “The Great Big Canadian Quiz” with 100 hilarious and eye-popping questions and answers.
I LOVE learning about people and what they like, what they find important, what they think etc… I also love providing the information through surveys and polls. Since the book is specifically Canadian, it’s even better (well for Canadians anyway.) I could barely put it down (yes even though it’s nonfiction,) and I found how people in the different provinces and territories are different, very interesting.
The book is separated into Parts, and then again into Chapters. The parts are:
Part One: Where Do You Belong? (results by location)
Part Two: Who Are We, Eh? (Results by “type” of person – gender, big earner, scholar, age, parent, techies, etc…
Part Three: How Well Do you Know What You’re Thinking? – The Great Big Canadian Quiz
First let me point out that these are averages based on polls. No one asked every single Canadian, just a random sample. Also just because most Albertans, techies or parents believe or do something, doesn’t mean every Albertans, techie or parent believes it/does it.
I”m an Ontarian, and here are some interesting facts I learned about Ontarians:
– Apprantly Ontarians are very average when it comes to things such as going out on New Year’s Eve, reading the Bible, reading books in general, sleeping naked, claiming to be boss of household etc….
– To find us a bit above the average, you have to address nationalism.
– Ontarians feel strongly about not dating a smoker, wanting Canada to be active in world affairs, eavesdropping (82% admit to listening to other people’s conversations) and others
There’s a whole list of what makes Ontarians unique too. All of this information is given for the other areas too. Just a quick note: Saskatchewan and Manitoba are grouped together, all of Atlantic Canada is grouped together and the northern territories are grouped together.
The whole book is peppered with bar charts and pie charts but they are easy to understand, not technical in any way.
The Great Big Canadian Quiz at the end is to see if after reading the book you can guess how the majority of Canadians answered each question. It was fun and I did pretty good.
Also the donut on the cover of the book is actually a representation of a real chart to show the favourite kinds of donuts of Canadians. You’ll have to read the book for the final results.
Links of Interest: Interview with Darrell Bricker at HarperCollins, Ipsos Canada,
Other Reviews: Serendipitous Readings,
Buy We Know What You’re Thinking
About Kathleen
