GALLUP NEWS SERVICE
PRINCETON, NJ -- The latest Gallup Youth Survey, which asked Americans aged 13 to 17 about the appropriate penalty for murder, finds the opinions of adults and teenagers to be miles apart. Adults are closely divided, 49% to 47%, on whether the proper punishment is the death penalty or life in prison without parole. Teenagers, however, lean almost 2-to-1 in favor of the latter.
Given the choice between the death penalty and life imprisonment, close to two-thirds of teens (64 percent) favor life imprisonment with absolutely no possibility of parole as the penalty for murder. In contrast, just 32 percent of teens favor the death penalty. The teen findings are notably different from recent findings among adults. When last asked, in September of 2000, 49 percent of adults 18 and older said they would favor the death penalty for a person convicted of murder when given the choice between that option and life imprisonment with no possibility of parole. Less than forty-seven percent supported life imprisonment. At the same time, 67% of adult Americans favor the death penalty for murder when they are given no explicit alternative in the question wording.
For teens, personal characteristics have some effect on opinion -- younger teens (13 to 15) are more likely than their older counterparts to favor life imprisonment (66 percent, compared with 61 percent). Education may play a role in teens' opinions, as well. Teens of higher academic standing, and teens whose parents both attended college, are more likely to favor life imprisonment over the death penalty than are teens in the counterpart groups.
Finally, and perhaps not surprisingly, religion enters picture as well. The concept of the death penalty presents a moral dilemma that may be approached differently by adherents of diverse beliefs. In this survey, Protestant teens are more likely to choose the death penalty (34 percent, versus 23 percent of Catholics); Catholics are more likely to choose life imprisonment (71 percent, versus 62 percent of Protestants) as the penalty for committing murder. Teens who attended religious services last week are more likely to favor life imprisonment (70 percent) -- as do 60 percent of teens who did not attend -- as punishment for murder. Teens who did not attend church are more likely to favor the death penalty (35 percent, versus 28 percent of those who attended). This finding suggests that teens more actively engaged with an organized religion have more ambivalent feelings about the death penalty.
There are no notable differences between the attitudes of boys and girls on this issue.
Survey Methods
The survey results for youth are based on telephone interviews with
a randomly selected national sample of 500 American teenagers,
13-17, conducted July through October 2000. For results based on
this sample, one can say with 95 percent confidence that the
maximum error attributable to sampling and other random effects is
plus or minus 5 percentage points.
Survey results for adults are base on telephone interviews with a randomly selected national sample of 1,012 adults aged 18 or over. For results based on this sample, one can say with 95 percent confidence that the maximum error attributable to sampling and other random effects is plus or minus 3 percentage points. In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.
