Originally posted on VIMN E-Newsletter.

Prior to the 6 Nov 2012 election date in the US, VIMN embarked on a project to find out what Millennials across Europe and Latin America think about the candidates and whom they would vote for.

The result: Millennials around the world were backing Barack Obama to win this year’s US presidential election.

The research – conducted among 18 to 34 year olds engaged in the Viacom online community in the UK, Spain, France, Italy, Germany, Mexico and Argentina – looked closely at the impact of the election on the international Millennial generation.

Key findings of the survey, which took place in October, reveal that Millennials demonstrate an active interest in global issues with 86% agreeing it is their responsibility to stay informed about local, national and world events.

The US election is seen as an important global event (77%) with almost half of all respondents considering it as important as their own country election (48%).

Millennials in Italy, Spain and Latin America place significantly more importance on the event (57% and 55% respectively), with those in France indicating the least importance on the event.

Millenials around the world are showing little faith in government leadership with 23% thinking it will get better and 41% thinking it will only get worse.

Obama is the favoured candidate across all countries and political views. The vast majority said they would vote for him; he was also regarded as most likely to win the US election – a view that turned out to be correct. President Obama is believed to be a better president from a global perspective and he is perceived as more suitable than Mitt Romneyto tackle major social and political issues.

According to findings, three quarters would vote for Obama and less than 1 in 10 would vote for Romney.

Across all countries and political views, Obama is the favoured candidate to tackle all issues, although respondents are uncertain as to who is best suited to tackle the euro crisis and drug control.

The research also identified that the Millennial respondents mainly use television and the internet to gain information about the US election with social media playing a limited role. Brits and Spaniards are the least active when it comes to using social media sources to gain information about the US election (26%) , while Italians lead in the use of social media (35%).