Identities, Opportunities and Challenges

• First conducted in 2015

• 3,000 adults whose characteristics mirror those of the general population

• Fielded online by YouGov

• Core of questions about the health of American families

• Modules about specific issues and trends differ each year

MarriagePeople remain optimistic

about their own marriages, but less so

about marriages generally.

8 6 7 6

4442 42

40

46

50 4952

40 3937 37

4042 41 41

8 7 8 6

Your Marriage Marriages Generally

2015 2016 2017 2018 2015 2016 2017 2018

0

25

50

75

100

Year

Percentage Status

WeakerAbout the SameStronger

Evaluations of Marriage

Marriage and Trump

IdentityPolitical scientists obsess

over identity, typically partisan identities, but

what we find is that family relationships are

the more important identities.

70 71

43

29 28

37

30

0

25

50

75

100

Spouse Parent Religion Race Political Party Career or Job Community

Perc

enta

ge S

ayin

g `E

xtre

mel

y' o

r 'V

ery'

Impo

rtan

t

Identity Commitment

Identity and Race

4546

37

52

61

42

18

46

9

0

25

50

75

100

Spouse Identity Parent Identity Race Identity

Perc

enta

ge S

ayin

g `E

xtre

mel

y Im

port

ant'

RespondentWhiteBlackHispanic

Spouse and Parent Identity by Race

Most Important Issues by

PartyDemocrats focus on

economic issues, while Republicans prioritize

culture. Both emphasize the need for increased discipline of children.

35

59

78

72

49

39

90

82

68

0

25

50

75

100

Economics Culture Family Structure

Type of Issue

Perc

enta

ge PartisanshipDemocratsIndependentsRepublicans

Vote Choice and the Most Important Issues Facing Families

Economic Stresses

Among those without children, the cost of

raising a child was the most frequently cited

factor in decisions about whether to have

children.

2017 Modules

• Relationship Sequence

• Teens and Technology

• Sexual Harassment and Consent

• Immigration

• Policy / Taxes?

Relationship Sequence

Differences between actual and ideal, on

average 2.111.74

2.122.33

2.152.51

3.753.37

Sex

Cohabit

Marriage

Child

1 2 3 4Mean Order

Rel

atio

nshi

p M

ilest

ones

aa

ActualIdeal

Relationship Sequence

Relationship Sequence

Black Democrats are more similar to

Republicans than to white Democrats in their

ideal relationship sequences

2.261.82

2.252.35

1.792.36

3.793.46

1.721.43

2.052.22

2.532.68

3.823.53

2.421.74

2.112.47

1.912.47

3.733.07

Republicans White Democrats Black Democrats

1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4

Sex

Cohabit

Marriage

Child

Mean Order

Rel

atio

nshi

p M

ilest

ones

a aActual Ideal

Relationship Sequence by Party and Race

Teens and Technology

Parents’ views of the most important issues

facing teens

American Family Survey Summary Report: Identities, Opportunities, and Challenges 36

respondent could choose up to four issues. Table 16 presents the results. The most common concern fromthese parents was overuse of technology, which was the only option chosen by a majority of respondents.In addition, 45 percent of respondents identified bullying as an important issue, and approximately one-third of respondents chose mental health issues, family breakdown and divorce, or pressure to use drugsor alcohol. All other items on the list were chosen by less than a quarter of respondents.

Table 16 also shows that mothers and fathers largely agreed on these priorities. The only major differenceswere that mothers reported substantially more concern about bullying than fathers, but fathers expressedmore concern than mothers about teens facing family breakdown and divorce.

Table 16: Most Important Issues Facing Teens

Overall Fathers Mothers

Overuse of technology 53 55 51Bullying 45 38 51Mental health issues 36 34 37Family breakdown/divorce 35 43 29Pressure to use drugs or alcohol 34 35 33Poor quality schools 23 21 24Making decisions about sexual activity 20 20 20Difficult relationships with family members 15 15 15Dating and relationships 14 15 14Pressure to get good grades 14 14 14Widespread availability of pornography 12 14 11Safety in their communities 11 9 13Not enough meaningful work opportunities 10 12 9Navigating sexual identity 10 11 9Sexual abuse 9 8 10Other 2 2 2

Larger differences can be found between Republicans and Democrats, however. These differing assess-ments can be seen in Figure 17, where red bars indicate the percentage of Republicans choosing the issue,blue bars indicate Democrats, and purple bars show results for independents who do not lean towardeither party. While overuse of technology was an important concern for respondents of both parties,Republicans expressed comparatively more concern about the issue (64 percent) than Democrats (48 per-cent). In addition, concern about the effects of divorce and family breakdown on teenagers was heavilyconcentrated among Republicans (54 percent), but of far less concern to both independents (33 percent)and Democrats (17 percent). Republicans were also somewhat more likely than Democrats to expressconcern about teens’ decisions about sexual activity (23 percent vs. 15 percent) and the availability ofpornography (17 percent vs. 10 percent).

Conversely, Democrats expressed more concern than Republicans about bullying (48 percent vs. 38 per-cent), mental health issues (44 percent vs. 30 percent), community safety for teenagers (15 percent vs. 9percent), and work opportunities (14 percent vs. 7 percent). On other issues, such as pressure to use drugsor alcohol, dating and relationships, navigating sexual identity, pressure to get good grades, relationshipswith family members, and the quality of schools, we see rough agreement (defined here as partisan differ-ences that are about five percentage points or less) between partisans. Notably, given that the survey wasadministered prior to the Kavanaugh hearings, the difference between partisans in concern about sexualabuse among teenagers was small (11 percent of Democrats, compared to nine percent of Republicans).

Other demographic characteristics also mattered, especially in patterns of concern about overuse of tech-

Technology Use

Parents estimate their teen sons spend 24 hours/week on video games and their teen daughters spend 24 hours/week on social

media

Sexual Harassment • 43 percent of all respondents have experienced something inappropriate.

• 28 percent of men

• 58 percent of women

• 23 percent at work

• 15 percent from an authority figure at school or work

• More often from college educated

Sexual Harassment

People do distinguish between different

activities, but women have more stringent

standards than do men as to what counts.

77

62

71

49

66

40

27

20

29

17

11

8

9

5

5

3

Persisting in Unwanted Attention

Asking for Sexual Favors

Looking at Private Parts

Placing a Hand on Back

Sexual Jokes

Commenting on Appearance

Asking to Go for a Drink

Asking to Go for Lunch

0 25 50 75 100Percentage Responding the Activity `Always' counts as Harassment

GenderMaleFemale

Attitudes about Sexual Harassment

An ExperimentPeople are more concerned about behavior that men

commit towards women than they are about the

reverse.

57

67

39

59

33

47

7678

66

76

61

70

Male Female

Persisting inUnwanted Attention

Asking forSexual Favors

Looking atPrivate Parts

Persisting inUnwanted Attention

Asking forSexual Favors

Looking atPrivate Parts

0

25

50

75

100

`Alw

ays'

coun

ts a

s H

aras

smen

t

TreatmentMan to WomanWoman to Man

Consistency in Attitudes about Sexual Harassment

Consent: Verbal and Non-Verbal

Women are more likely to believe that consent

must be “verbal” though all groups favor the idea of some form of consent

for the most serious forms of contact.

73

61

18

27

63

50

27

37

Having Sex Intimate Touching

Yes, Must Be Verbal Yes, but Could Be Non-verbal Yes, Must Be Verbal Yes, but Could Be Non-verbal

0

25

50

75

100

Percentage Gender

MaleFemale

Consent and Gender Differences

Immigration Policy and

FamilyThe Groups Everyone

wants to Admit: Children, Spouses,

Parents

Controversial Groups: Extended Family

69

84

63

79

50

78

30

66

26

62

12

44

12

45

12

42

0

25

50

75

100

Child Spouse Parent Sibling Grandparent Aunt/Uncle Niece/Nephew Cousin

Family Member

Perc

enta

ge F

avor

ing

PIDDemocratRepublican

Family Immigration Support

Asylum Requests and

Family SeparationOnly 1 in 10 want

separated families and children in detention

facilities. There is more controversy over how intact families should

report for asylum hearings.

11

6

37

46

Separated: Children in a Detention Facility

Separated: Children with Relatives or Foster Care

Together: Held in a Detention Facility

Together: in the Country

0 25 50 75 100

Preferred Immigration Policy on Family Separation

TaxesPeople of all stripes tend not to believe that recent tax cuts would help their family. Only 30 percent of women believed this.

American Family Survey Summary Report: Identities, Opportunities, and Challenges 61

7.4 Family Experience and Tax Cuts

How do people feel about the recently passed tax cut bill? On this survey we asked how people felt thatthe bill affected various groups, described in Table 26. There was a predictable partisan split on the taxbill, with Republicans favoring it much more often than Democrats. Nonetheless, strong majorities of therespondents believe that the tax bill will help large corporations and wealthy individuals. The sample waseffectively split down the middle on whether it would help small businesses. Only a minority believedthat the bill would help middle- and lower-income persons. The most striking feature is that by the groupleast likely believed to get any benefit out of the tax bill is the respondent’s own family.

Table 26: Beliefs about whom the recent tax cut would “help”

Groups Overall Average

Large Corporations 68Wealthy Individuals 63Small Businesses 49Middle-Income Individuals 43Low-Income Individuals 37Your Family 35

We investigated the degree to which these attitudes varied across the key sub-populations examined in theAmerican Family Survey. While it is true that higher income individuals were more favorably disposedtoward the tax cut, we generally found only muted variation by group. Figure 37 breaks down support bykey sub-groups: gender, marital status, and whether or not a respondent had children. The clear pattern isthat the object of help was the dominant consideration for most respondents. While it is true that womentended to think that the tax cuts would help less across the board, all demographic groups we investigatedfollowed the same basic pattern of believing that various types of business would be helped by the law,as would wealthy citizens. People are simply more skeptical that the policy will help out other groups insociety.

PolicyWe underestimate how much family matters for

policies—especially local policies.

21

27

42

34

3942

59

54

0

25

50

75

100

Democrat Republican

StatusSingleWithout KidsMarriedWith Kids

Percentage Choosing Roads over Schools

Discussion• Everybody remains happy with their own families, but express concern about the

state of the American family. The growing worry for people is economic instability.

• Family identity matters a lot.

• Norms about the proper sequence of relationship milestones differ by both party and race.

• Women experience sexual harassment much more often and, perhaps consequently, have more stringent standards for conduct between the sexes, although everyone is more concerned about men’s behavior toward women.

• Continued attention to public opinion about the family and family policy is our goal.