New Study Reveals How Americans View Mormons

Pew Research Center conducted the survey, “How Americans Feel About Religious Groups,” which was released today (July 16). Included in this survey was how Americans feel about members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, oftentimes referred to as Mormons. 

Pew Research asked its 3,217 randomly selected adult participants to rate different religious groups on a “feeling thermometer.” The thermometer ratings ranged from 0 to 100 with 0 signifying a cold, negative feeling towards the group and 100 signifying a warm, positive feeling. Latter-day Saints received ratings that were actually rather neutral, averaging out at rating a of 48.

The image below shows the “feeling thermometer” and  how Americans view various religions.

Latter-day Saints fall in the middle of the scale, along with Hindus and Buddhists. Religion News Network says some of the factors that influenced the participants who rated the groups are age, people they know, race, and political party affiliation. Older Americans (over 65 years of age) view Christians and Jews more favorably than younger Americans (under 30 years of age). On the contrast, other groups, like Muslim, received higher ratings from the younger Americans and lower ratings from the older crowd. In addition, when participants personally knew someone in a religious group, they rated the group almost 10 to 20 points higher than groups where they didn’t know any members.

RNS reports that David Campbell, University of Notre Dame political scientist, said he was surprised at the study’s findings on Latter-day Saints. Campbell is quoted saying:

“There hasn’t been any real change in views on Mormons in spite of the (hit Broadway play) The Book of Mormon and Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign and all the attention to the so-called Mormon Moment.”

Participants rated Jews, Catholics and evangelical Christians the highest at 63, 62 and 61, respectively. Read more about the study at pewforum.org.