The confidence that U.S. college students have in secure free speech has fallen to its lowest level in a decade, according to a new national survey.
Just 37% of college students surveyed in a Knight Foundation-Ipsos report released Tuesday consider freedom of speech secure, down from 73% in 2016. Yet, 84% of the interviewed students say the right to speech is extremely or very important to them.
According to its website, the Knight Foundation is a “nonpartisan and community-centered organization that promotes a healthy and engaged democracy.” The organization produces polls, research and funds organizations that promote free expression, its website said.
At USC, recent changes to university-wide speech policies recently gave the university an improved institutional ranking on a separate free speech poll. After reevaluating the university’s written policies, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression moved USC from 198th to 37th out of 261 colleges surveyed for its annual free speech rankings, according to previous Annenberg Media reporting.
Stephanie Cho, a junior majoring in psychology, said she regularly speaks up in her class on the psychology of persuasion, where she said students debate ideas and bring different perspectives to the discussion. Cho said she trusts USC to support her ability to express an unpopular opinion, but she is hesitant to share political opinions or discuss aspects of her identity.
“I feel like everyone’s very respectful here on campus,” Cho said. “Anything political I don’t really like talking about.”
The Knight Foundation report drew on a survey conducted between March 23 to April 7 among U.S. adults aged 18 to 29, with additional sampling of undergraduate students aged 18 to 24.
Ricardo Mor, an officer on Knight Foundation’s information and society team who led its work on the research, said the foundation has studied high school students’ attitudes on free expression since 2004 and college students’ attitudes since 2016. This year’s expanded research also examines young adults who do not attend college and those in the workforce.
“It’s really pretty fascinating, especially in an era where we think people are oversharing,” Mor said. “It’s clear that young people feel the need to still keep things to themselves.”
Garrett Podgorski, a second-year master’s student studying classical guitar, described his graduate classes as an inclusive environment where he feels comfortable expressing his views, but he generally avoids posting political opinions on social media.
While an undergraduate student at Pepperdine University, Podgorski said he sometimes held back with friends whose views differed from his because he worried about damaging relationships, especially in the field of music, where connections are important.
“I feel like artists in general have typically more liberal tendencies. So friends that I was in contact with might have an extreme view on something that I feel like I couldn’t give my two cents on. I didn’t want to lose a relationship or lose connection,” Podgorski said. “People get really offended nowadays, so it’s hard to feel like you’re in a safe spot.”
The Knight Foundation research found that wanting to keep personal views private was the leading reason young adults gave for holding back opinions. Fear of negative consequences was another cited reason, but the findings suggested that choosing silence can reflect several motivations.
Auren Amster, a freshman majoring in aerospace engineering, said people on campus often seem to share similar political views, so disagreements do not arise frequently. However that comfort does not necessarily extend to conversations about identity.
“Being Jewish, I do notice there are a lot of people that may not be as sensitive to that, and I don’t really bring that up with people,” Amster said. “It’s difficult to reveal that to them.”
Nationally, fewer college students reported feeling discomfort from comments about their identity than those surveyed by the Knight Foundation in previous years. According to the survey, 29% said they hadn’t felt uncomfortable on campus because of comments about their race, ethnicity, religion, gender or sexual orientation, down 15 percentage points from 2024.
That measure captures a different experience from whether students think their rights are secure nationally. Views on that question also differed sharply by party. Republican students’ confidence that free speech is secure rose from 34% in 2024 to 59% this year, while Democratic students’ confidence fell from 51% to 27% among those surveyed.
Ethan Beddia, a senior majoring in popular music performance, said his comfort expressing opinions comes from confidence in himself and a willingness to face criticism rather than relying on an institution to make expression comfortable.
“Not only do you have to be comfortable in expressing views, but be comfortable facing criticism or condescension,” Beddia said. “You got to turn the other cheek.”
Beddia said he usually shares his views only when someone asks, but those exchanges can become frustrating when people seek agreement rather than a conversation. He said some people will still respond aggressively when they hear something they dislike.
“Sometimes people only want to ask to confirm what they want to hear,” Beddia said.
Podgorski said his comfort expressing his views at USC also reflects the openness he sees in California.
“California overall has become a safer place because there are people who have made that kind of initial step to be free, have free speech and say what’s on their mind,” Podgorski said. “People here are less afraid to vocalize, especially about controversial topics.”
Edited by Miranda Huang.