Poll: Majority of Americans Say Civility Has Declined

Paying attention to others in all sorts of ways—talking with them, laughing together, really listening—is surely the foundation of civility. Alistair Berg/Getty Images

A vast majority of Americans believe that civility in society is worse than it was a decade ago, blaming social media and general media for the decline, according to the American Bar Association’s (ABA) annual poll released on April 27.

Fully 85 percent of the 1,000 respondents of the “ABA Survey of Civic Literacy 2023” (pdf) said civility in today’s society is worse than it was 10 years ago. Only 6 percent said it was better, while 8 percent said it is unchanged.