Bill Webster

For more than a decade, Pew Research Center has been tracking global patterns in restrictions on religion – both those imposed by governments and hostilities committed by individuals and social groups.

As a shop that studies human behavior through surveys and other social scientific techniques, we have a good line of sight into the contradictory nature of human preferences. Here's a look at how we categorize our survey participants in ways that enhance our understanding of how people think and behave.

Read about some of the ways focus group participants with ties to different faith traditions explain the complex relationship of religion and culture in their lives.

Why is there so much suffering and evil in the world? This question can be particularly confounding for those who believe in a good and all-powerful God, as is often described in the Abrahamic religious traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. For centuries, philosophers and theologians have grappled with this “problem of evil.”

A Pew Research Center survey conducted last year shows that the French held more favorable views of both Jews and Muslims than many other Europeans.

The Pew Research Center design staff picks the data visualizations we created in 2014 that they considered the most challenging and explains the approach to presenting our data.

Led by the prolific travels of Pope John Paul II, pontiffs have reached 135 different countries and territories at least once since 1964.