How do N.C. Baptists view the BSC?

By Ed Johnson

Special to the Recorder

Who are we as Baptists? In the 1950s, it often included particular signs of piety, such as abstaining from movies, mixed bathing, playing cards and dancing. Many of today's college students are unfamiliar with such concerns.

This brief series of articles is meant to examine who N.C. Baptists are. It's based on the results of a survey of 384 random Baptists from across the state. The questionnaire that was used addresses issues of attitudes, behavior, communication and more, especially as related to church.

The survey began as a research methods project for mass communication students at Campbell University, with the Baptist State Convention (BSC) being the client. John Roberson of the BSC met with the students to discuss the convention's communication needs. The students developed and pre-tested a questionnaire, executed the survey and tabulated the results. The BSC paid for printing and mailing the survey.

One of the first issues for any institution to consider is how people perceive it, and the BSC is no exception.

For that reason, the first question on the survey asked how people perceived the BSC on a scale of awareness. The respondents were instructed to:

"Please circle the most appropriate number after each of the 10 listed Baptist organizations and programs listed below.

"0 = I'm not aware of this organization or program.

"1 = I'm aware of this organization or program, but I don't know what it does.

"2 = I know this organization or program, but I don't view it positively.

"3 = I view this organization or program positively, but I don't financially support it.

"4 = I financially support this organization or program."

The most frequent response was from those who said they "financially support" the BSC (145 respondents or 38.7 percent). The next most frequent response was from those who "know this organization or program, but I don't view it positively" (103 respondents or 27.5 percent).

Next came those who "view this organization or program positively, but don't financially support it" (69 respondents or 18.4 percent); those who are "aware of this organization or program, but don't know what it does" (53 respondents or 14.1 percent); and finally, those who are "not aware of this organization or program" (5 respondents or 1.3 percent).

The typical communication goal of an organization is to move people along these steps toward becoming supporters. Many organizations would be pleased to have four out of 10 people supporting and only one percent unaware of it. The challenge for the BSC is to learn more about those people who know it, but don't view it positively. But that's the topic of another article.

The questionnaire asked the same question about eight other Baptist institutions or programs: Baptist World Alliance (BWA), Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF), Cooperative Missions Giving (CMG), N.C. Baptist Men (NCBM), N.C. Missions Offering (NCMO), Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) and Woman's Missionary Union (WMU).

Limitation of space prohibits presenting the full results on these organizations, so the most frequently given response to each (statistically called the "mode") is presented.

Survey respondents most frequently said they support the N.C. Missions Offering (49.3 percent), Woman's Missionary Union (40.1 percent), Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (38.8 percent), and Cooperative Missions Giving (37.7 percent), as well as the BSC (38.7 percent). One could speculate that responses to the Cooperative Missions Giving question might have been different had it been called the Cooperative Program (CP), a more traditional title.

Respondents most frequently said they view positively (but don't financially support) N.C. Baptist Men (40.8 percent) and the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary (39.0 percent). They most frequently said they knew, but didn't view positively the Southern Baptist Convention (46.0 percent). And finally, they most frequently said they were unaware of the Baptist World Alliance (32.2 percent).

One might question the validity of the findings. Research principles tell us that such a survey sample accurately represents the whole population of Baptists within a certain known range. To be specific, because these results came from 384 randomly selected N.C. Baptists, one can be 95 percent confident that these results represent the whole population of N.C. Baptists, plus or minus five percent.

For example, consider the finding that 38.7 percent of the respondents said they support the BSC; the "plus or minus five percent" part of that statement means that a range of 33.7 percent to 43.7 percent "support" the BSC. The "95 percent confidence" part of that statement means that one out of 20 survey questions will be off by more than the "plus or minus five percent" range. Such responses tend to fall into a predictable bell-shaped pattern.

The hope for this project was to provide N.C. Baptists with some helpful information, while providing Campbell University students with a valuable learning experience.

(EDITOR'S NOTE: Johnson is associate professor of mass communication at Campbell University. He came to Campbell in 2003 after teaching at state schools in Nebraska for seven years. In addition, he has previous public relations experience with Wycliffe Bible Translators, Zondervan and Baker Book House.)