An overwhelming majority, 71.06 per cent of the population, supports the Government's decision to award incentives to national athletes who won a record 12 medals at last year's London Olympics.

Our pollsters found that 21.98 per cent were against the incentives, while 6.96 per cent were 'not sure'.

Among the stars for Jamaica at last year's Olympics was Usain Bolt, who became the first athlete in history to retain the Olympic 100m and 200m titles.

More than $17 million in cash incentives was handed over to the athletes at a special ceremony on Heroes Day last year at the National Indoor Sports Centre.

The poll, which has a margin of error of plus or minus six per cent, was conducted between January 12 and 21, 2013 by Conroy Julian and Dr Paul A. Bourne. The sample size was 300 and participants were drawn from Kingston and St Andrew, St Thomas, St Catherine and Clarendon - five parishes which contain just over half of the country's population.

NOTE: Dr Bourne is director of the Socio-Medical Research Institute in Kingston, while Dr Julian is a development communicator and convener of the Association of Media Professional.