More than 1 out of 10 U.S. Hispanics are unfamiliar with American Holidays .

With the holiday season almost upon us, fully 15 per cent of the nation’s 40 million Hispanics — or six million people — likely will not be celebrating, this year. The reason:

Basic unfamiliarity with traditional American holidays, such as Halloween and Thanksgiving. That fact was one of various key findings made by Synovate Market Research last August, when it polled 500 U.S. Hispanics at various levels of acculturation. Another was that an overwhelming majority of them (65 per cent) would welcome learning more about the holidays as a way of improving their lives. Seventy-five percent opted to take the survey in Spanish.

General Mills commissioned the survey, which has a margin of error of +/- 3.5 per cent, as a way of gauging the need to make American holidays come alive for the Hispanic community.

“We believe familiarity with basic cultural traditions, such as holidays, constitutes an accurate indicator of a community’s or an individual’s level of acculturation,” said Rudy Rodriguez, Director,
Multicultural Marketing, General Mills. “In that regard, this study’s findings will greatly assist us in executing our overall Hispanic strategy, as well as in identifying those areas of everyday life on which we need to continue focusing.”

Other interesting findings of the Synovate survey included the following: Of the 85 per cent of respondents who demonstrated some level of familiarity with American holidays, almost two-thirds (57 per cent) mentioned the Fourth of July. Additionally, 55 per cent said it took them approximately two or more years of living in the country to become familiar with U.S. holidays, while for 24 per cent, the time was four years or more.