you may refer to fruitful discussion :

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2013/08/29/welfare-reform-gender-qualitative-evidence-bennett/

Dear Edmund,

try the following links: (There are mainly quantitave studies, but nobody can do quantitative research before collecting experience in qualitative research; so there's a great chance for you, to find what you are looking for)

Projekt "Einstellungen zum Wohlfahrtsstaat im europäischen Vergleich" (see: http://eswf.uni-koeln.de/forschung/ewv/)

Projekt "Wohlfahrtsstaatliche Maßnahmen und Einstellungen der Bürger" (see: http://eswf.uni-koeln.de/forschung/wme/index.html)

Working papers and publications:

Thorsten Heien (2000b): Attitudes Towards the Welfare State in Europe: Starting Point or Obstacle on the Road to a Social Union? Paper presented at the ECSR-Workshop "Comparative Social Justice Research", Oxford, United Kingdom, September 13-14, 2000. EWV-Arbeitspapier Nr. 2. (see attachment below)

Hans-Jürgen Andreß und Thorsten Heien (1998): Explaining attitudes towards the welfare state: Problems of a current research project. Paper for the Conference "Welfare States at the Crossroads". WME-Arbeitspapier Nr. 3. (see attachment below)

Hans-Jürgen Andreß und Thorsten Heien (1999a): Explaining Public Attitudes towards the German Welfare State using Structural Equation Models. Paper presented at the "Conference on Recent Trends and Methods of Social Stratification Research", Potsdam, Germany, April 30, May 1-2, 1999. WME-Arbeitspapier Nr. 7. (see attachment below)

Hans-Jürgen Andreß und Thorsten Heien (1999b): What determines people's attitudes towards the welfare state? A cross-cultural comparison using multiple-group structural equation models. Paper presented at the Conference "Large Scale Data Analysis", Cologne, Germany, May 25-28, 1999. WME-Arbeitspapier Nr. 8. (see attachment below)

Thorsten Heien und Dirk Hofäcker (1999a): How do welfare regimes influence attitudes? A comparison of five European countries and the United States 1985-1996. Paper presented at the ECSR-Workshop "Causes and Consequences of Socio-Economic and Political Attitudes in Eastern and Western Europe", Mannheim, Germany (October 7-8, 1999). WME-Arbeitspapier Nr. 9. (see attachment below)

Hans-Jürgen Andreß und Thorsten Heien (2000): Four Worlds of Welfare State Attitudes? A Comparison of Germany, Norway, and the United States. to appear in: European Sociological Review 17, no. 4 (December 2001). download under: http://esr.oxfordjournals.org/content/17/4/337.abstract

See also:

Morten Blekesaune and Jill Quadagno (2003): Public Attitudes toward Welfare State Policies. A Comparative Analysis of 24 Nations. Dowload under:

http://www.socsc.hku.hk/sigc/gc2013/pdf/Reading%20Materials_Taiwan/lecture%205b_Lih-rong%20wang.pdf.

Kohl, Jürgen (2013): Hohe Akzeptanz des Wohlfahrtsstaates trotz kritischer Leistungsbewertung: Wohlfahrtsregime und Einstellungen zum Wohlfahrtsstaat im europäischen Vergleich. Download under:

http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-353068

Kind regards and good luck Detlef

Dear Edmund,

Your topic "attitudes to the welfare system" is a general term. So you have to develop your topic by single questions and to decide, which questions are suitable. Perhaps you find, what you are looking for there:

I've had a look an the website of the British Social Attitude Survey. For the years 2012 and 2013 I've found the following headlines with many items under register "Variable Description" (see link below):

Dataset: British Social Attitudes Survey, 2012. Variable Group Public Spending and Social Welfare. There are more than 30 items.

Dataset: British Social Attitudes Survey, 2012. Variable Group Public Spending and Social Security 2. There are also more than 30 items.

Dataset: British Social Attitudes Survey, 2013. Variable Group Public Spending and Social Security. There are also more than 30 items.

Dataset: British Social Attitudes Survey, 2013. Variable Group Public Spending and Social Security 2. There are also more than 30 items.

Dataset: British Social Attitudes Survey, 2013. Variable Group Public Spending and Social Security 3.  There are also more than 30 items.

You find the Variable Group Public Spending and Social Welfare also for former years, e.g.: Dataset: British Social Attitudes Survey, 2011. Variable Group Public Spending and Social Welfare.

Last (not least): Try the following report:

Elizabeth Clery, Lucy Lee and Sarah Kunz (2013): Public attitudes to poverty and

welfare, 1983-2011. Analysis using British Social Attitudes data. (see link below)

I've found the following media release:

• UK attitudes on immigration and welfare 'toughening';  under: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-19621020
• Public attitudes to benefits are hardenin; under: http://www.poverty.ac.uk/report-attitudes-welfare-system-benefits/public-attitudes-benefits-are-hardening
• What's causing toughening attitudes to welfare? Views from the front line at the Labour Conference; under: http://www.natcen.ac.uk/blog/whats-causing-toughening-attitudes-to-welfare-views-from-the-front-line-at-the-labour-conference

There are many hints, that your topic has got a real background, becaus harshening attitudes to the welfare systems led to reduced willingness to help the poor and socially excluded members of the society. So I wish you good luck for your research!

Kind regards

Detlef

http://nesstar.ukdataservice.ac.uk/webview/index.jsp?v=2&mode=documentation&submode=abstract&study=http://nesstar.ukdataservice.ac.uk:80/obj/fStudy/7476&top=yes

http://www.natcen.ac.uk/media/137637/poverty-and-welfare.pdf

Many thanks Hisham and Detlef for your really helpful answers.

Explore my thesis perhaps you can find some Literature

keen Regards

Many thanks Rui!

A priori, I would guess that such a politically laden question of study will be dominated be low quality ideologically driven research. I would immediately lend credibility to those researchers who demonstrate awareness of sensitivity of results to the ways in which questions are framed and are openly self critical in this regard.

Is that an answer to the question?

You asked "will I find A?", and I answered "when you do, please beware of a lot of low quality research". My apologies, I could have said nothing and assumed that you are perfectly aware of this. A talented researcher should always be able to separate the drivel from the stuff that is actually informative from the perspective of academic intellectual inquiry.