Participation in several traditional forms of religious observance has declined in recent years. For example, the share of Americans who say they attend religious services at least once a week has ticked down by 3 percentage points since 2007, as has the share who say they pray every day. These declines are closely connected to […]
Thursday, April 23, 10 A.M. to 11:30 A.M. The Pew Research Center’s new demographic projections– the first formal forecasts using data on age, fertility, mortality, migration and religious switching for the world’s eight major religious groups – finds that the religious profile of the world is rapidly changing. By 2050, the number of Muslims around […]
Christians remain by far the largest religious group in the United States, but the Christian share of the population has declined markedly. In the past seven years, the percentage of adults who describe themselves as Christians has dropped from 78.4% to 70.6%. Once an overwhelmingly Protestant nation, the U.S. no longer has a Protestant majority. […]
The 2014 Religious Landscape Study has several unique strengths. Its large sample size (n=35,071) and detailed, branching set of questions about religious identity make it possible to estimate the size of a wide variety of religious groups with a high degree of precision. The large sample also makes it possible to describe the characteristics of […]
As of 2010, nearly a third of the world’s population identified as Christian. But if demographic trends persist, Islam will close the gap by the middle of the 21st century.
More than nine-in-ten people in the Middle East and North Africa were Muslim as of 2010 (93%), and the share of the region’s population that is Muslim is expected to be slightly higher in 2050 (94%). The Middle East-North Africa region’s Muslim population is expected to grow by 74% from 2010 to 2050, from 317 […]
Alan Cooperman is Director of Religion Research at Pew Research Center, where he and his team study the role of religion in today’s world. Alan’s work focuses on religious change both in America and globally. He broadly oversees the Center’s efforts to measure religious and spiritual beliefs and practices; explore the intersection of religion, politics […]
When demographers attempt to forecast changes in the size of a population, they typically focus on four main factors: fertility rates, mortality rates (life expectancy), the initial age profile of the population (whether it is relatively old or relatively young to begin with) and migration. In the case of religious groups, a fifth factor is […]