What do the most Americans fear? The fourth Chapman Survey on American Fears, and being innumerate

It is almost Halloween, and thus time for folks to scare us with surveys about fears. On October 11th Chapman University released results from their fourth Chapman Survey on American Fears with a press release mistitled What do Americans fear most? and a blog post titled America’s Top Fears 2017. Their overall web page provided a link to an Acrobat .pdf file with details for the survey methodology and results.  

A commercial polling firm, SSRS, surveyed 1207 American adults from June 28 to July 7, 2017. In their main survey each was asked around eighty questions with the general form:

“How afraid are you of the following…:”

and replies of

“Blank (skipped answering this question)

Very Afraid

Afraid

Slightly Afraid

Not Afraid”

Data processed by the university for the blog post apparently was blank corrected (rescaled) to correct their results in percent by multiplying by a factor of (100/(100 – Blank percent). The list of fears in the blog post reportedly was ranked by the sum of the percentages for Very Afraid and Afraid. So they actually reported what most Americans fear and NOT what Americans fear most. (You actually can calculate the latter as a Fear Score, as I have previously blogged about back in 2015).    

When I compared the list of fears in the blog post with percentage results in the .pdf file, I found lots of discrepancies larger than what could be explained as rounding errors. Fifteen of them were for items where there is no blank correction, so they must just be incorrect sums. Others had more complicated problems. The worst discrepancy was for Cyber-terrorism which was listed as 39.1% and ranked nineteenth but really was 47.9% and should have been ranked ninth. So, not even their Top Ten list was correct! The word to describe this sort of nonsense is innumerate, which the Oxford Dictionaries defines as:

“without a basic knowledge of mathematics and arithmetic”

There actually also were 81 fears rather than the 80 shown in the blog post, and that 81st fittingly was that of Being fooled by ‘fake’ news.

Here is my corrected ranked listing of all the fears, with the Chapman rankings shown second in curved brackets {} and the page number, question number, [blank corrected sum], (sum), and sum reported in the Chapman blog post :

1. {1} Corrupt Government Officials p79 q29c [74.1%] (73.8%) 74.5%

2. {2} American Healthcare Act/Trumpcare p79 q29e [55.7%] (55.4%) 55.3%

3. {3} Pollution of Oceans, Rivers, and Lakes p52 q13c [54.0%] (54.0%) 53.1%

4. {4} Pollution of Drinking Water p52 q13b [52.6%] (52.5%) 50.4%

5. {5} Not having enough money for the future p53 q14a [51.4%] (51.3%) 50.2%

6. {6} High Medical Bills p53 q14c [49.2%] (49.2%) 48.4%

7. {7} The US will be involved in another World War p62 q22n [48.6%] (48.3%) 48.4%

8. {9} North Korea using nuclear weapons p63 q22s [48.3%] (48.3%) 47.5%

9. {19} Cyber-Terrorism p58 q21c [47.9%] (47.8%) 39.1%

10. {8} Global Warming & Climate Change p53 q13f [46.8%] (46.7%) 48.0%

11. {12} Extinction of plant and animal species p52 q13d [45.9%] (45.9%) 43.5%

12. {10} Air Pollution p51 q13a [45.3%] (45.3%) 44.9%

13. {15} Biological Warfare p63 q22q [45.3%] (45.3%) 41.8%

14. {11} Economic/Financial Collapse p61 q22k [44.7%] (44.5%) 44.4%

15. {14} Identity Theft p72 q25o [44.6%] (44.5%) 41.9%       

16. {13} Terrorist Attack p63 q22r [44.1%] (44.0%) 43.3%

17. {17} People I love dying p51 q12d [42.1%] (42.1%) 39.7%

18. {16} Credit Card Fraud p72 q25p [41.9%] (41.7%) 40.3%

19. {18} People I love becoming seriously ill p51 q12b [41.4%] (41.4%) 39.1%

20. {21} Nuclear Weapons attack p61 q22i [41.3%] (41.3%) 39.0%

21. {20} Widespread civil unrest p62 q22m [41.1%] (40.9%) 39.1%

22. {23} Government restrictions on firearms and ammunition p79 q29d [40.9%] (40.7%) 38.6%

23. {22} Terrorism p73 q25r [40.2%] (40.0%) 38.8%

24. {26} Oil spills p52 q13e [39.0%] (39.0%) 36.2%

25. {24} Government tracking of personal data p59 q21e [38.2%] (38.0%) 37.4%

26. {28} Being hit by a drunk driver p69 q25e [37.8%] 37.8%) 35.5%

27. {27} The collapse of the electrical grid p61 q22h [37.4%] (37.3%) 35.7%

28. {25} Corporate tracking of personal data p58 q21d [36.6%] (36.5%) 36.7%

29. {30} Pandemic or a major epidemic p62 q22l [35.9%] (35.8%) 32.8%

30. {29} The Affordable Care Act/Obamacare p78 q29b [35.4%] (35.3%) 33.9%

31. {32} Nuclear accident/meltdown p61 q22j [32.6%] (32.5%) 30.3%

32. {31} Being unemployed p53 q14b [31.9%] (31.9%) 30.7%

33. {35} Random/mass shooting p71 q25j [30.8%] (30.8%) 28.1%

34. {36} Government use of drones within the US p78 q29a [30.6%] (30.5%) 27.2%

35. {34} Heights p66 q23l [30.0%] (29.9%) 28.2%

36. {33} Losing my data, photos, or other important documents in a disaster 

  p54 q14d [29.0%] (29.0%) 29.0%

37. {38} Break-ins p71 q25k [28.4%] (28.3%) 26.2%

38. {40} Theft of property p71 q25l [28.4%] (28.4%) 25.4%

39. {42} Computers replacing people in the workforce p58 q21a [28.0%] (27.9%) 25.3%

40. {37} Devastating drought p60 q22f [27.9%] (27.8%) 26.6%

41. {43} Devastating tornado p58 q22c [27.6%] (27.6%) 24.3%

42. {39} Becoming seriously ill p50 q12a [26.9%] (26.8%) 25.7%

43. {41} Sharks p65 q23f [26.1%] (26.0%) 25.4%

44. {45} Devastating earthquake p59 q22a [24.8%] (24.8%) 22.6%

45. {47} Racial/hate crime p70 q25i [24.6%] (24.6%) 20.9%

46. {57} Gang violence p71 q25m [24.0%] (24.0%) 19.4%

47. {44} Reptiles (snakes, lizards, etc.) p64 q23d [23.9%] (23.9%) 23.6%

48. {51} Financial fraud p72 q25q [23.4%] (23.4%) 20.0%

49. {46} Devastating hurricane p59 q22b [23.3%] (23.3%) 21.4%

50. {59} Police brutality p70 q25f [23.3%] (23.3%) 18.4%

51. {52} Public speaking p67 q23m [23.3%] (23.3%) 20.0%

52. {50} Insects/arachnids p64 q23c [23.2%] (23.2%) 20.3%

53. {53} Devastating flood p60 q22d [23.0%] (23.0%) 19.8%

54. {60} Murder by a stranger p69 q25c [22.1%] (22.1%) 18.3%

55. {54} Mugging p68 q25a [22.0%] (21.9%) 19.5%

56. {58} Sexual assault by a stranger p70 q25g [21.9%] (21.8%) 19.0%

57. {48} Dying p51 q12c [21.6%] (21.6%) 20.3%

58. {49} Illegal immigration p63 q22p [21.1%] (21.1%) 20.3%

59. {55} Small enclosed spaces p67 q23n [20.9%] (20.9%) 19.8%

60. {56} Walking alone at night p57 q20b [20.2%] (20,2%) 19.8%

61. {61} Deep lakes and oceans p66 q23i [20.1%] (20.1%) 18.2%

62. {62} Abduction/kidnapping p72 q25n [18.9%] (18.9%) 15.5%

63. {65} Stalking p69 q25b [17.8%] (17.7%) 14.1%

64. {63} Devastating blizzard/winter storm p60 q22e [17.6%] (17.6%) 15.2%

65. {--}Being fooled by ‘fake’ news p57 q20d  [16.4%] (16.4%) ---

66. {66} Sexual assault by someone you know p70 q25h [15.6%] (15.6%) 12.4%

67. {67} Murder by someone you know p69 q25d [14.9%] (14.9%) 11.6%

68. {64} Technology I don’t understand p58 q21b [14.8%] (14.8%) 14.9%

69. {70} Large volcanic eruption p60 q22g [14.2%] (14.2%) 10.6%

70. {72} Flying p66 q23j [12.7%] (12.7%) 9.5%

71. {68} Germs p65 q23h [12.7%] (12.7%) 11.5%

72. {71} Needles p62 q23b [12.5%] (12.5%) 10.4%

73. {69} Whites no longer being the majority in the US p62 q22o [10.8%] (10.8%) 10.7%

74. {73} Strangers p67 q23p [9.8%] (9.8%) 8.4%

75. {75} Significant other cheating on you p57 q20a [9.2%] (9.2%) 7.5%

76. {76} Clowns p65 q23g [8.0%] (7.7%) 6.7%

77. {74} Others talking about you behind your back p57 q20c [7.2%] (7.2%) 7.5%

78. {78} Zombies p67 q23o [6.7%] (6.7%) 5.3%

79. {77} Blood p65 q23a [6.4%] (6.4%) 5.5%

80. {79} Ghosts p66 q23k [5.6%] (5.6%) 4.3%

81. {80}Animals (dogs, rats, etc.) p65 q23e [4.1%] (4.1%) 3.7%

Note that fear of public speaking came in around fiftieth, far from the silly usual claims that it is the number one or greatest fear. You won’t be hearing many speaking coaches quote that result for marketing purposes!

The image was adapted from this one at openclipart.