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posted by martyb on Sunday October 16 2016, @08:53PM   Printer-friendly
from the The-only-thing-we-have-to-fear-is... dept.

Chapman University recently completed its third annual Chapman University Survey of American Fears (2016). The survey asked respondents about 65 fears across a broad range of categories including fears about the government, crime, the environment, the future, technology, health, natural disasters, as well as fears of public speaking, spiders, heights, ghosts and many other personal anxieties.

In addition to the set of fears examined in previous waves, the survey team took a closer look at two fear related phenomena: Americans' beliefs in conspiracy theories and fear of Muslims, sometimes referred to as "Islamophobia."

In its third year, the annual Chapman University Survey of American Fears included more than 1,500 adult participants from across the nation and all walks of life. The 2016 survey data is organized into five basic categories: personal fears, conspiracy theories, terrorism, natural disasters, paranormal fears, and fear of Muslims.

The 2016 survey shows that the top 10 things Americans fear the most are:

  • Corruption of government officials (same top fear as 2015)
  • Terrorist attacks
  • Not having enough money for the future
  • Being a victim of terror
  • Government restrictions on firearms and ammunition (new)
  • People I love dying
  • Economic or financial collapse
  • Identity theft
  • People I love becoming seriously ill
  • The Affordable Health Care Act/"Obamacare"

http://phys.org/news/2016-10-americans-annual-survey-american.html

A comprehensive list of the all the fears is available from The Chapman Survey on American Fears 2016.

A video is also available at: https://youtu.be/Rr0XAFbe8b8

Previously:
What Americans Fear Most (2014)


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 16 2016, @09:58PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 16 2016, @09:58PM (#414983)

    If concerns about corruption in the government are a major issue, it's no wonder that Hillary is widely disliked, and any alternative to her viewed with more interest than would otherwise be the case.

    The charitable interpretation, that she's a competent politician who knows how to get things done within the system, and has a Realpolitik understanding of how things actually happen, is easily interpreted by people who worry about government corruption as her being adept at gladhanding, back room deals and coverups. Such people might easily say: "Well, sure, Trump is a racist, sexist, egotistical child of privilege, but at least he isn't living under a double standard where he doesn't get prosecuted because he's in the Beltway Inner Circle."

    You don't have to like Trump, or dislike Hillary, to see that dynamic at work.

    Now combine that with the concern about firearms, where Hillary is a proven and outspoken gungrabber (sure, she's not coming to take your guns, but she thinks Australia's mandatory buyback aka compensated confiscation was a good idea, and beat the drum for Bill's antigun legislation) and she becomes a really hard package to sell.

    Personally I think Trump would do the world a favour by having a tragic car crusher accident, but it's not hard to see how Hillary looks very bad by this calculation.

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  • (Score: 2) by tonyPick on Monday October 17 2016, @06:45AM

    by tonyPick (1237) on Monday October 17 2016, @06:45AM (#415121) Homepage Journal

    It's an interesting idea, and IMO the level of distrust/belief in corruption also ties up with the conspiracy theories section of the survey - to quote:

    more than half of all Americans believe the government is concealing information about the 9/11 attacks; as well as the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Another 40 percent believe the government is hiding information about extra-terrestrials and global warming; and one-third believe there are conspiracies surrounding Obama's birth certificate and the origin of the AIDs virus. Nearly one-fourth of Americans also believe there is something suspicious about the death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

    "We found clear evidence that the United States is a strongly conspiratorial society," said Dr. Bader. "We see a degree of paranoia in the responses. Most indicative is nearly one-third of respondents believed the government is concealing information about 'the North Dakota crash,' a theory we asked about that - to our knowledge - we made up," Dr. Bader continued.

  • (Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Monday October 17 2016, @09:29AM

    by cubancigar11 (330) on Monday October 17 2016, @09:29AM (#415146) Homepage Journal

    Personally I think Trump would do the world a favour by having a tragic car crusher accident

    You have a culture which thinks wishing a man's death is cool and you fear for terrorism. *eyes roll*

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 17 2016, @06:07PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 17 2016, @06:07PM (#415300)

      Really? That's what you get from that?

      Seriously?

      Quite aside from whether the GPposter is afraid of terrorism (wasn't mentioned in the post) I see no contradiction between being willing to wish death on others, and a rational expectation that it might be reciprocated.

      Maybe you're just unfamiliar with less sheltered environments than your own?

      • (Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Monday October 17 2016, @07:43PM

        by cubancigar11 (330) on Monday October 17 2016, @07:43PM (#415335) Homepage Journal

        You can't see me laughing. Oh man...

        There is no excuse to wish anyone's death. If you find yourself doing that, YOU are the one in sheltered environment.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 17 2016, @07:51PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 17 2016, @07:51PM (#415347)

    "If concerns about corruption in the government are a major issue, it's no wonder that Hillary is widely disliked, and any alternative to her viewed with more interest than would otherwise be the case."

    I think this the correlation goes the other direction, or that this fear and Hillary's perception or both symptoms of the current climate. The campaign for the presidency effectively started in 2015, and since then about half of Americans have had fear of government corruption and the idea that Hillary is corrupt marketed to them very heavily. In 2014, people were rightly more worried about direct threats to themselves and their families. Every few years, both sides of the political aisle try to make the electorate feel actual gut-level fear about abstract threats like corruption, low-odds threats like terrorism, and long-term threats like global warming.

    That's not to say those things are important. They're all important. But the intensity of the fear and the perceived immediacy are bizarre.

    As long as I'm making an inane, anonymous political post: http://www.fairvote.org/ [fairvote.org]
    A less-stupid voting system is the best thing we can do for the health of the system in the long-term.