Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
Guest Contributor
Senior research staff answers questions from readers relating to all the areas covered by our seven projects ranging from polling techniques and findings, to media, technology, religious, demographic and global attitudes trends.
In a number of surveys over the past several months, the Pew Research Center has shown where the public stands on the budget deficit — the seriousness of the problem, views of competing policy proposals, and its confidence in the policymakers.
As media organizations plot their future, it’s worth discarding some misconceptions about what it will take to keep the press from becoming yesterday’s news. Here, in an aricle prepared for the Washington Post, are five frequent, if faulty, allegations:
Researchers recently presented some findings that dispute the popular (or academic) wisdom about important aspects of family life and bear upon relevant findings from Pew Research surveys.
With a deadline approaching for a possible shutdown of the federal government, the public remains divided over whether congressional Republicans or the Obama administration would be more to blame if a shutdown occurs.
While the media pivoted to Libya, the public did not follow, keeping their focus on the crisis in Japan. Americans give the press high marks for their coverage of the Japan disaster and Libya conflict, but have little praise for media coverage of economics and politics.
March 25, 2011 marks the 100-year anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, a disaster widely credited with strengthening the still nascent labor union movement in the United States. Public approval of unions, which peaked in during the Depression era when many worker protections were put into law, has had its ups and downs but has hit new lows in recent years.
Support for the increased use of nuclear power has declined amid the ongoing nuclear emergency in Japan. But with the surge in gas prices, support for increased offshore oil and gas drilling is growing.
More than half of U.S. adults used the internet for political purposes in the last cycle, far surpassing the 2006 midterm contest. They hold mixed views about the impact of the internet: It enables extremism, while helping the like-minded find each other. It provides diverse sources, but makes it harder to find truthful sources.
By several measures, the state of the American news media improved in 2010. After two dreadful years, most sectors of the industry saw revenue begin to recover. The biggest issue ahead, however, may not be lack of audience or even lack of new revenue experiments. It may be that in the digital realm the news industry is no longer in control of its own future.
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