Modern Morals

The Pew Research Center recently published a study "A Barometer of Modern Morals" regarding the American public's view of different behaviors as being morally wrong, morally acceptable, or not a moral issue.

The activity that drew the most widespread moral disapproval, 88%, was "married people having an affair," while the one that drew the least was "overeating" - although a sizable minority (32%) said that activity was morally wrong. Two moral issues that have had the greatest political resonance in recent years - homosexuality and abortion - divide the broad public in almost exactly the same way, but are seen differently by some sub-groups in the population. Men are more morally disapproving than women of homosexuality, but both genders have similar views about abortion. Likewise, the old and the young judge the morality of these two behaviors in different ways. On the question of homosexuality, the old are more disapproving than the young. But on the question of abortion, there is no clear difference between the old and the young. Catholics are more disapproving of abortion than they are of homosexuality. Married people are more disapproving of abortion than are those not currently married, but there is no clear difference between the married and unmarried on homosexuality. Majorities of three groups - weekly church-goers, white evangelical Christians and those ages 65 and older - say that nine of the 10 behaviors are morally wrong. Among these groups, overeating is the only behavior not judged by a majority to be morally wrong.