Significant numbers of Westerners do not see Islam as compatible with the values of their society, new research from YouGov has revealed.

The research, conducted to coincide with the Pope's historic visit to Abu Dhabi last month, found that Westerners tended to view other religions in a more favourable light. 

The study also revealed widespread concern about the possible rise of extremism in Islam. 

France and Germany were the most negative in their perception of Islam, with 46 per cent and 47 per cent respectively agreeing that 'there is a fundamental clash between Islam and the values of society in my country'.  This fell to 38 per cent in Britain and 36 per cent in the US. 

Notably lower across Western countries was the proportion of people agreeing with the alternative statement that Islam was generally compatible with the values of society in their country. Britain was the most positive towards Islam, with 24 per cent agreeing with the statement, followed by France (22 per cent), Germany (20 per cent) and the US (17 per cent). 

By contrast, Westerners were far less likely to be concerned about a clash of values when it came to other religions. 

In the US, only 14 per cent perceived such a clash with Buddhism, 15 per cent with Sikhism and 14 per cent iwth Hinduism.

Similarly, only 6 per cent of British respondents felt there was a values clash with Buddhism, while just 8 per cent said the same for both Sikhism and Hinduism. 

Other results from the study showed general impressions of Islam among Westerners to be less favourable than their impression of other world religions.

In France, nearly half of those surveyed (49 per cent) said they felt fairly (18 per cent) or very (31 per cent) unfavourable towards Islam.

This was far higher than the percentage of respondents who had unfavourable impressions of Judaism (19 per cent), Hinduism (13 per cent), Sikhism (14 per cent), Buddhism (9 per cent) and Christianity (15 per cent).  

In Germany, over half (53 per cent) felt unfavourable towards Islam, compared with a range of only 10 per cent to 22 per cent who had the same attitude towards the other world religions. 

The study revealed a similar trend in the US and UK, although in these countries the overall proportion of people  viewing Islam unfavourably was far lower (37 per cent and 32 per cent respectively). 

Consistent across the Western respondents, though, was a concern about the rise of extremism in Islam.  France and Germany had the highest percentage of respondents describing themselves as very or fairly concerned about this (both 72 per cent), followed by 66 per cent in Britain and 56 per cent in the US. 

'As findings show, substantial portions of Western respondents in the survey perceived a clash between Islam and the values of society in their country,' said Dr Joel Rogers de Waal, academic director at YouGov.