Growing Minority Holds Consistent Ideological Views On a 10-item scale of political values, % who are...
To chart the progression of ideological thinking, responses to 10 political values questions asked on multiple Pew Research surveys since 1994 have been combined to create a measure of ideological consistency. Over the past twenty years, the number of Americans in the “tails” of this ideological distribution has doubled from 10% to 21%. Meanwhile, the center has shrunk: 39% currently take a roughly equal number of liberal and conservative positions. That is down from about half (49%) of the public in surveys conducted in 1994 and 2004.
Growing Minority Holds Consistent Ideological Views  | On a 10-item scale of political values, % who are...  | 1994  | 2004  | 2014  | More are now on the left  | and the right, with fewer  | holding a mix of positions.  | 18  | 49%  | 23  | 8  | 25  | 49%  | 15  | 3  | 12  | 22  | 39%  | 18  | Mostly Consist- tently  | Consist ently Mostly  | Consist- ently Mostly  | Mostly Consist. ently  | Consist- Mostly  | Mostly Consist ently  | ently  | tently  | ently  | Consist. ently  | ently  | ently  | MIXED CONSERVATIVE  | MIXED CONSERVATIVE  | LIBERAL  | LIBERAL  | MIXED CONSERVATIVE  | LIBERAL  | Source 2014 Political Polariza tion in the American 10 Public politica  | Source Notes: Ideolo 2014 Political gica consistency grouped.j Polariza tion based in the on a American scale of 10 Public politica I'va lues questions (See Appendixa for details on how the scale is constructed  | Notes: and how Ideolo scores gica are consistency grouped.j  | PEW RESEARCH CENTER 