3 Things to Know: National Security Concerns Rise as Comfort Traveling Holds Steady, Well-Being Declines Among Young Women

CivicScience continually tracks current and anticipated consumer trends. Here are three key insights marketers should know this week:

1. Terrorism and national security threat concerns are up this month.

Americans may be feeling more positive about the future of the economy, but they are also becoming more concerned about national security. CivicScience data show that the percentage of U.S. adults who say they are ‘very concerned’ about terrorism or national security threats increased in February (to 33%) after declining over the last six months. This increase follows headlines about the potential security threat posed by balloons and other unidentified flying objects over the U.S.

2. Comfort traveling is on the rise.

Comfort doing most public activities declined this week, with ‘going to a major public event’ experiencing the biggest drop (-3 percentage points), occurring amidst growing concerns over national security, gun violence, and the bird flu virus (details available in our report – learn more).

However, travel expectations continue to look promising. The latest CivicScience data show that comfort traveling/going on vacation is up this week, with 60% reporting they’re comfortable doing this now. This is in line with recent CivicScience data showing that a whopping 54% of U.S. adults plan to travel in the next month, and 42% of Gen Z travelers are likely to book summer travel reservations in the next two months.

3. Feelings of sadness increased sharply among young women in the past week.

A startling new report by the CDC finds record-high levels of depression among teen girls. CivicScience emotional well-being data show low emotional well-being even among young adult women compared to the general population. In particular, nearly 2-in-3 women between 18 and 34 years old have felt ‘very’ or ‘somewhat sad’ over the last week or so, which is up nine percentage points from the beginning of February and resting at an overwhelming 25 percentage points higher than the current national average.

In other findings (available in our full report), LGBTQ+ adults also consistently score lower on overall emotional well-being than the Gen Pop. If you’d like to see the full report, let’s chat.