Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
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State of the Nation: Bright Surpassing even Clinton’s hike in approval ratings in the past two weeks is a 13% point jump in satisfaction with the way “things are going in this country today.” Fully 59% of Americans now say they are satisfied with the country — the highest number since the end of the […]
Design of the Influential Americans Survey Sample The results of the Opinion Leaders survey are based on Americans who are influential in their chosen field. The sample was designed to represent these Influentials in ten professional areas of expertise: media; business and finance; foreign affairs; defense; state and local government; think tanks and academia; religious […]
Design of the Influential Americans Survey Sample The purpose of the Pew Center survey was primarily to learn what America’s leadership elites believe America’s role in the post Cold War world should be. These leadership respondents, whom we call America’s Influentials or Opinion Leaders, consisted of 591 men and women chosen from recognized lists of […]
Introduction and Summary The post-Cold War era may be less than a decade old, but Americans whose views help shape U.S. foreign policy have grown remarkably comfortable with it. Compared to four years ago when they were deeply troubled, American Opinion Leaders today see the world as a better place, where U.S. influence is enhanced […]
Introduction and Summary The American public is more critical of press practices, less enthusiastic about the news product and less appreciative of the watchdog role played by the news media than it was a dozen years ago when The People & The Press surveys were inaugurated. Those polls concluded that criticism of the way the […]
Opinion of National Media Slumps Increased criticism of specific press practices may have contributed to the more general decline in favorability toward various news media outlets. Favorable ratings for the national network television news have fallen to a twelve year low. Only 15% of Americans now have a very favorable opinion of the network TV […]
Survey Findings Despite the new spirit of bipartisanship in Washington and the sense of optimism inside the beltway that a budget agreement may finally be at hand, the American public is extremely bearish about the prospects for a balanced budget. Just 28% believe President Clinton and the GOP Congressional leaders will be able to reach […]
About 12% of Americans go online to get information on current events, public issues and politics. On average, one third of these said they go online for news as many as three days a week. This level of online use has remained fairly stable across six studies completed by the Center this year. Compared to […]
Introduction and Summary The numbers are still modest but the Internet is beginning to play a role in the news habits of a significant number of American consumers. Over one-in-five Americans now go online — either at home, work or school. Nearly three-fourths of this group sometimes get news from the World Wide Web or […]