Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World

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  • report

    The German Census Falls Short

    This is a link to a FactTank posting about how the German census counted 1.5 million fewer people than the government expected, mainly because of poor government record-keeping. This lesson is relevant to plans for the next U.S. Census.

  • short reads

    Lessons from the German census

    When the results of the 2011 German census were announced recently, they included an embarrassing error – at least in the demographics world. It showed the German population was 1.5 million people short of what the government had expected. The news dealt a blow to Germany’s reputation for efficient record-keeping, and it’s also relevant to […]

  • short reads

    What Americans really want from their lawmakers

    Americans often say they want their representatives in Congress to put the country’s needs over local concerns. But four novel experiments suggest that the public does just the opposite.  In a new study, respondents rated a member of Congress far more favorably if the lawmaker put the interests of his or her district or state […]

  • short reads

    LGBT voices that shaped our study

    Before we launched our first major effort to capture the views and opinions of LGBT adults for our series ‘LGBT in Changing Times,’ we convened a focus group to help inform our approach. In March 2013, we assembled 12 LGBT adults from the Washington, D.C. area: five gay men, three transgender adults, two bisexual men […]

  • report

    New Census Figures Raise a Good Question

    This is a brief description of a posting on FactTank about new Census Bureau population estimates that show deaths among non-Hispanic whites exceeded births in 2012.

  • report

    The New American Father

    A new survey by the Pew Research Center finds that Americans expect dad to be more of a moral teacher and emotional comforter than a breadwinner or disciplinarian.

  • feature

    LGBT Voices: The Coming Out Experience

    In the Pew Research Center’s survey of LGBT adults, we asked respondents to share three key points in their personal coming out journeys: When they first thought they might be something other than straight or heterosexual; When they knew for sure that they were lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender; and When they first told a close friend or family member about their sexual orientation or gender identity.

  • report

    LGBT Voices: The Coming Out Experience

    Browse hundreds of quotes from LGBT adults describing how the process of telling people about their sexual orientation or gender identity was for them personally.