Factors affecting public attitudes towards the EU in the United Kindom

The European Union is going through difficult times. Until the Maastricht Treaty, the public was relatively less interested in European integration; this situation is changing against the integration process day by day. Ordinary citizens in Europe are no longer as indifferent to the EU issue and this increase in interest is increasingly bringing the institutional future of the EU into question. At this point, it is of great importance to examine the factors that affect attitudes towards the EU. Since the EU is made up of societies with different cultural, economic and political backgrounds at various levels, the research scope of this thesis is limited to only examine the factors affecting UK public attitudes towards the EU. This preference has been influenced by the fact that the United Kingdom is widely known as the most skeptical member state across the EU. Thus in this doctoral dissertation the latest versions of five data sets; "Eurobarometer (EB), European Values Study (EVS), European Social Survey (ESS), British Social Attitudes (BSA)" were used to conduct five binary logistic regression models to examine the factors affecting the support for the EU in the UK. Comparing the logistic regression findings of the five models, the factors such as positive economic prospects, the adoption of European identity, satisfaction with democracy are among the strongest predictors of the EU support, while concerns about the negative effects of immigration on the economy and culture are found to be diminishing the EU support. Keywords: EU Support, Euroscepticism, Brexit, Economic Voting, Identity, Immigration, Media, Parties.