August 5, 2025
In general, younger adults are less interested and engaged in U.S. politics than older individuals. Although two-thirds of adults ages 18-29 feel it is important for people to vote, they are less likely than adults over 45 years old to see the value. Younger adults are also less inclined to pay much attention to news about American politics. That generational gap is apparent not only in how closely different age groups follow politics in general, but also how much they care about various issues including government spending and immigration.
Those ages 18 to 29 are less likely than adults 45 and older to feel voting is very or extremely important. People ages 45 and older are especially likely to say voting is extremely important compared with those under 45.
However, partisans aged 18 to 29 are more likely than independents under 30 to view voting as important. Forty-five percent of young independents say voting is very or extremely important compared with about three quarters of young Democrats or Republicans.
Adults under age 45 are also less likely than older adults to follow U.S. politics closely. Fully a third of younger adults do not follow U.S. politics very closely or at all.
Attention to politics increases with age. An AP-NORC Teen poll conducted in the spring found teenagers age 13-17 even less interested with 44% of teenagers reporting they do not follow politics closely. Thirty-nine percent of teens say they follow politics “somewhat closely” and 17% follow politics “very” or “extremely” closely.
Among adults under 30, young women are less interested in U.S. politics than men. Party identification also plays a role with young Democrats more likely than young independents or Republicans to follow U.S. politics closely. Young independents are least likely to follow U.S. politics.
Among adults under 30, the economy tops the list as the most important issue followed by health care, taxes, and natural disaster relief. About half of adults aged 18 to 29 view government spending, trade negotiations with other countries, and immigration as important issues to them. The situation in the Middle East is the issue area that the fewest 18- to 29-year-olds view as personally important.
Younger adults are also less likely to view some issues as important to them compared to older adults. Those age 18-29 are less likely to view taxes, the economy, government spending, immigration, or trade negotiation as personally important compared to those ages 45 and older. Adults ages 60 and older are especially likely to view government spending, natural disaster relief, immigration, and the situation in the middle east as personally important. The gap in opinion is particularly stark when it comes to government spending with 8 in 10 of those over 45 years old viewing it as a key issue compared to half of those aged 18 to 29.
While most younger adults view the importance of most of these issues similarly regardless of gender, party identification, or education level, there are partisan differences that emerge for health care and natural disaster relief. Young Democrats are more likely than young Republicans to consider health care (83% vs 57%) and natural disaster relief (71% vs 43%) as personally important.
The nationwide poll was conducted July 10-14, 2025 using the AmeriSpeak® Panel, the probability-based panel of NORC at the University of Chicago. Online and telephone interviews using landlines and cell phones were conducted with 1,437 adults. The overall margin of sampling error is +/- 3.6 percentage points. Respondents age 18-29 were sampled at a higher rate than their proportion of the population for reasons of analysis. The overall margin of sampling error for the 386 completed interviews with respondents age 18-29 is +/- 6.6 percentage points.
Suggested Citation: AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. “Younger adults are less engaged with U.S. politics.” (July 2025). https://apnorc.org/projects/younger-adults-are-less-engaged-with-u-s-politics/
