We asked respondents whether they approve or disapprove of how U.S. President Joe Biden is dealing with five major international concerns. Adults in some countries, including Kenya, Poland and Thailand, hold more positive assessments of how Biden has handled these five concerns. On the other hand, people in Tunisia and Turkey rate Biden extremely negatively […]
This section describes the methods used to estimate religious composition at the country level, regionally and globally; our procedures for measuring religious groups’ demographic characteristics and their religious “switching” rates; as well as methodological challenges that we considered in some countries. The final section lists the 201 countries and territories that make up each of […]
Government restrictions on religion, by region The global median score on the Government Restrictions Index (GRI) rose from 2.8 in 2020 to 3.0 in 2021, the highest it’s been since Pew Research Center created the index in 2007. Both Europe and the Americas saw increases in their regional GRI scores, though their median scores remained […]
In many places surveyed, 20% or more of all adults have left their childhood religious group. Christianity and Buddhism have had especially large losses.
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.