A Couple Headlines + Excerpts:
Rot of nation's core values quantified by single poll. By Mike Allen/Axios, March 28, 2023
“Rarely does one poll stare so deeply into the soul of a nation and tell its story…The poll quantifies a generational and political divide that shows a rot at the very soul of our nation.”
Americans frightened by shock poll on diminishing importance of traditional values. By Megan Myers/Fox News April 1, 2023
“Core principles once central to Americans' values receded in importance this year, according to a Wall Street Journal-NORC poll published Friday.”
The Poll in Question:
This was a poll funded by the Wall Street Journal and conducted by NORC, a nonpartisan research organization at the University of Chicago. Randomly selected U.S. households were sampled from a panel designed to be representative of the U.S. household population. Interviews were conducted between March 1-13, 2023 with adults aged 18 and over; 1,019 completed the survey. Respondents were offered a small monetary incentive for completing the survey.
The Survey Question and Responses That Got the Most Media Attention:
“Now, we would like to ask you some questions about the American character, that is, about our values and who we are...How important are each of the values to you personally? Would you say it is very important, somewhat important, not that important or not important at all?”
Here’s the response breakdown:
So What was the Problem?
Those alarmed at these poll results had three main concerns. First, endorsement of key values was less whole-hearted than they had been in the 1998 poll. Specifically, there were fewer “Very Important” responses to values such as hard work and community involvement, even though most respondents still considered these values at least somewhat important (94% and 80% in the case of hard work and community involvement). Second was the overall decline in valuing religion, having children, and patriotism, with 40%, 33%, and 27% of respondents considering these values as “not that important” or “not important at all” in the 2023 poll. And third, a whopping 90% of the 2023 respondents considered money an important value. What’s up with that?
My Own (Preliminary) Take
Appearances can deceive. Compared to telephone surveys, online surveys tend to be less biased by the social desirability concerns of respondents. And the 1998 survey was conducted by telephone interview, whereas 96% of the 2023 respondents answered their questions online. This may explain, at least in part, why the 2023 questions elicited a more tempered response than in 1998, when a real live person asked the same questions. Not that tempered is bad.
Also, how people feel about a specific value depends on they feel about other stuff. Values don’t exist in a vacuum; they compete with other values and other concerns. For example, work-life balance concerns may lessen one’s enthusiasm for hard work and uncertainly about economic conditions may increase the value of making money. (Ironically, making money typically requires hard work - but you don’t have to consider the value of hard work very important to be willing to work very hard.)
Finally, two points in time do not a trend make.
Next: Extending the comparison to three points in time: 1976-77, 1998, and 2023.