Support for legal abortion is widespread in many places, especially in Europe
Majorities in most of the 27 places around the world surveyed in 2023 and 2024 say abortion should be legal in all or most cases.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Majorities in most of the 27 places around the world surveyed in 2023 and 2024 say abortion should be legal in all or most cases.
Among the 32 places surveyed, support for legal same-sex marriage is highest in Sweden, where 92% of adults favor it, and lowest in Nigeria, where only 2% back it.
Across 11 questions on cultural subjects, the gap between the left and right in the U.S. is wider than in the European countries surveyed.
Focus groups with young adults in France, Germany and the United Kingdom revealed that these young people see the U.S. as the “world’s policeman” with a self-interested history of interventionism, while China is labeled the “world’s factory,” respected for its economic dominance but criticized for its expansionism and human rights violations.
A median of 45% across 34 surveyed countries say it is necessary to believe in God to be moral and have good values. However, public opinion on this question, as well as the role of God, prayer and religion varies by country, region and economic development.
A look at how supporters of European populist parties stand out on key issues, from the European Union to Putin.
Thirty years ago, a wave of optimism swept across Europe as walls and regimes fell, and long-oppressed publics embraced open societies, open markets and a more united Europe. Three decades later, a new Pew Research Center survey finds that few people in the former Eastern Bloc regret the monumental changes of 1989-1991.
Despite broadly positive sentiments among Germans about the changes of the past 30 years, views differ in some notable ways in the former West and East.
Read key takeaways from a new survey that explores European attitudes three decades after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.
On issues including national identity and religious minorities, views among UK adults align very closely to general opinion across the EU.
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