American Worries About Global Warming Surge To All-Time Highs

Our latest national survey finds that a large majority of Americans say the issue of global warming is personally important to them, outnumbering those who don’t by more than a 2 to 1 margin.The percentage of Americans who say global warming is personally important is now at a record high (72%), up 9 percentage points since March 2018. 

Other record highs include:

• 73% of Americans think global warming is happening, an increase of 3 percentage points since March 2018.
• 62% of Americans understand that global warming is mostly human-caused (+4 points since March 2018). By contrast, a record low 23% say it is due mostly to natural changes in the environment (-5 points since March 2018).
• 69% of Americans are worried about global warming, including 29% who are "very worried”, an 8-point increase since March 2018.
• 65% think global warming is affecting weather in the United States, and 32% think weather is being affected "a lot." About half think global warming made the 2018 wildfires in the western U.S. (50%) and/or hurricanes Florence and Michael (49%) worse.
• 48% think people in the United States are being harmed by global warming "right now" – an increase of 9 percentage points since March 2018.
• About half of Americans think they personally (49%, +7 points since March 2018) and/or their family (56%, +9) will be harmed by global warming. Majorities think global warming will harm people in their community (57%, +8 points), people in the U.S. (65%, +7 points), people in developing countries (68%, +6 points), the world's poor (67%, +4 points), future generations of people (75%, +4 points) and/or plant and animal species (74%, +3 points).

The report includes many other interesting findings, including how often Americans hear and talk about global warming: