Major New Poll: 56% Back Marriage

Via the Associated Press:

In the late 1980s, support for gay marriage was essentially unheard of in America. Just a quarter century later, it's now favored by clear majority of Americans. That dramatic shift in opinion is among the fastest changes ever measured by the General Social Survey, a comprehensive and widely respected survey that has measured trends on a huge array of American attitudes for more than four decades. Support for a right of same-sex couples to marry has risen 8 percentage points in the past two years and jumped 45 points since the question was first asked in 1988, when only 11 percent of Americans said they agreed with the idea. The survey now finds that only a third of Americans are opposed to gay marriage.

The General Social Survey is conducted by NORC, an independent research organization based at the University of Chicago, with funding from the National Science Foundation. It is a highly regarded source of data about social trends because of its long-running and comprehensive set of questions about the demographics and attitudes of the American public. Data from the 2014 survey was released this week, and an analysis of its findings on gay marriage was conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the General Social Survey. The survey found that 56 percent of Americans overall now agree that gay and lesbian couples should have the right to get married, up from 48 percent who said so in 2012.

The survey also showed that nearly 75% of those ages 18-34 support same-sex marriage. Read the full brief.