Introduction

The limits of free expression have long been debated and tested on college campuses. In recent years, accelerated by political pressures and digital advancement, this dialogue has grown more fraught.

Since 2016, Knight has been measuring college student attitudes toward speech and the First Amendment. This research has offered nuanced and evolving insights into how college students perceive campus speech and First Amendment protections over the years and into the future. The findings reinforce that students are not a monolithic group when it comes to speech, showing that partisanship, race and ethnicity drive meaningful differences in how college students view speech.

Understanding where different groups stand is vitally important for higher education leaders as they seek to foster free expression on college campuses and create environments that are conducive to intellectual inquiry for all.

We also invite the public, policymakers and researchers to use our publicly available data in their own work.

Key Findings

Students view speech rights as important, yet less secure than in years past.

While students continue to believe First Amendment rights and concepts of free speech are important to democracy, the percentage of students saying speech rights are secure has fallen in every subsequent study since this question was first asked in 2016. In recent years, this decline has been driven by Democratic students.

Students are finding it harder to express themselves freely, especially Black students.

Students in the survey are asked to rate how difficult it is for various groups to use their free speech rights without consequence in America today on a scale of 1 to 7, where 1 is very difficult and 7 is very easy. When it comes to how easy it is for “people like me” to use free speech rights, students on average rate it a 4.4, a slight decline from 2021 (4.6), showing that students feel that it is becoming more difficult to express themselves.Black students are significantly more likely to say it is harder for people like them to express themselves (3.3), compared with students of other racial or ethnic backgrounds (ranging from 4.2 to 4.8).

More students believe colleges should protect students from offensive speech than in the past.

Most students continue to say colleges should allow students to be exposed to all types of speech, including political speech that is offensive or biased, rather than prohibiting speech they may find offensive. However, results for 2024 indicate that there may be shifting feelings regarding exposure to versus protection from potentially offensive speech. Relatedly, there is increasing discomfort with speech on campus.

Students believe that speech can be as damaging as physical violence.

Perhaps related to the increasing levels of discomfort with speech on campus, a majority of college students (70%) believe speech can be as damaging as physical violence. Again, female (74%), Black (81%), Hispanic (74%), and Democratic (82%) students are the most likely to say this.

Many students report self-censoring in class, despite it limiting educationally valuable conversations.

Two in three students (66%) say self-censorship limits educationally valuable conversations on campus often or sometimes. Two in three students (69%) also report self-censoring on at least one frequent topic of conversation on college campuses; the topics Knight-Ipsos tested range from gender and identity to religion and politics. Out of the options shown, students most often report self-censoring on gender or LGBTQ+ issues (42%), racial issues (36%) or religion (35%).

Trust in faculty and administrators is important for students to feel comfortable sharing opinions in the classroom.

Overall, a majority of students trust college and university faculty (68%) and administration (57%). In comparison, far fewer trust the government (29%) or social media companies (12%). Ultimately, trust in faculty and administrators is correlated with expression in the classroom. Students who don’t trust administrators or faculty are less likely to feel comfortable sharing their opinions in in-person class discussions or online/virtual class discussions.