Panaji: One-third of expatriate Goans surveyed recently want to move away from the "song and dance syndrome", and many felt that their home state is being degraded by "industrial growth, the influx of migrants or mass tourism".

'Goan Digest', a London-based community magazine, said its recent survey found a general feeling that Goans needed to learn to act as a "mature and responsible community" and enskill themselves for more creative pursuits.

Its survey studied the views of some 566 expatriates from Goa, including 400 settled in the UK.

Goans were becoming more individualistic and less caring, many of those surveyed felt. Most also agreed that latching onto Western ways had brought on more stress in marriage.

Some 85% of respondents claimed to be either superficially or moderately Westernised. About three-quarters felt that although they lived in the West, they did not consider themselves as really belonging to mainstream society.

Expatriates who felt attached to Goa stressed that the "roots" of Goan culture lies in its cuisine, folk song and dance, religious rituals, and traditions (like forms of greeting, weddings, funerals or feasts).

Nearly 80% of this group also felt that Goa's unique topography -- beaches, palm groves, paddy fields -- and village basics like shrines and market were a "basic ingredient of our culture".

Others felt the need to include Goa's history, its Hindu heritage, links with the Konkan coast, and the legacy of a caste- driven feudal structure in understanding regional culture.

One in seven of those Goans surveyed had no attachment to Goa. One wrote: "Goa is no longer the place that our parents claimed as one's own.... It has changed for the worse, its economy has been taken over by outsiders, many of them unscrupulous sharks."

Five UK-born children of Goan expatriates, in their 20s, said they enjoyed Goa's scenic beauty while on holiday, but were put off by poor standards of hygiene, facilities and the general level of disorganisation in traffic, post offices and airlines.

Traditional "Goan" values of mutual support through the extended family and respect for elders was breaking down due to a decline in religion and parental authority, felt the majority. Consumerism and the media was also playing its role in this.

Overseas Goans communities are settled in Britain and mainland Europe (mainly Portugal), the Anglo-dominated territories of Australia and New Zealand and North America, East Africa and elsewhere (Brazil, Macao and Singapore).

There are also Goan settlers in the Gulf region. Earlier, a survey was conducted in 1977, mainly around the Greater London area.