Poll: 2 In 10 American Adults Believe End Of World Coming In Their Lifetime

Do you believe the world will end during your lifetime?

Findings from a recent poll show you wouldn’t be alone. From a press release on the Ipsos website last Tuesday:

One in seven (14%) global citizens agree ‘the world will come to an end during my lifetime,’ according to a new poll by global research company Ipsos on behalf of Reuters News. One in ten (10%) believe ‘the Mayan calendar, which some say ‘ends’ in 2012, marks the end of the world’ and another one in ten (8%) admit they ‘have been experiencing anxiety or fear because the world is going to end in 2012.’ The poll was conducted among 16,262 adults in 21 countries.

(Editor’s note: Italics added for emphasis)

The belief that the world will end soon appears to be more accepted among American adults. The Ipsos poll showed that 22 percent of adult respondents in the United States agreed with the statement “the world will come to an end during my lifetime.”

Personally, I would have found the survey even more interesting if Ipsos had asked not just about “the end of the world” but “the end of the world as we know it,” or TEOTWAWKI.

Yes, there is a difference.

You can read the entire press release on the Ipsos website here.