Social Media Seen as Mostly Good for Democracy Across Many Nations, But U.S. is a Major Outlier
Most think social media has made it easier to manipulate and divide people, but they also say it informs and raises awareness.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Most think social media has made it easier to manipulate and divide people, but they also say it informs and raises awareness.
Most say U.S. is reliable partner, and ratings for Biden are mostly positive – although down significantly from last year.
The Chinese Communist Party is preparing for its 20th National Congress, an event likely to result in an unprecedented third term for President Xi Jinping. Since Xi took office in 2013, opinion of China in the U.S. and other advanced economies has turned more negative. How did it get to be this way?
A median of 68% across 19 countries think their country has done a good job dealing with the coronavirus outbreak, with majorities saying this in every country surveyed except Japan. However, most also believe the pandemic has created greater divisions in their societies and exposed weaknesses in their political systems – and these view are especially common in the U.S.
Older Americans, those with more education and men tend to score better on our 12-question quiz about international knowledge. Republicans and Democrats have roughly the same levels of international knowledge, while conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats tend to score better than their more moderate counterparts.
Much larger shares of people in most nations see China’s influence growing than say the same of the United States.
CORRECTION (Dec. 19, 2025): One chart and some of the text in this chapter have been revised to correct the SHI median scores for the Asia-Pacific region, Europe and the Middle East-North Africa region for 2019. The median scores changed by 0.1 point for these regions in 2019. Refer to the errata page for details. Government restrictions on […]
People in advanced and emerging economies have mixed feelings about social media’s impact on political life.
As daunting challenges from Russia, China and a flagging global economy ripple across the world, Americans and Germans continue to say that relations between their countries are good. Most Americans and Germans continue to see each other as partners on protecting European security, and publics in each country are willing to support using military action to protect themselves and their allies.
In Thailand, Cambodia and Sri Lanka, more than 90% of Buddhists see strong links between their religion and country. In the neighboring countries of Malaysia and Indonesia, nearly all Muslims say being Muslim is important to being truly part of their nation.
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