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Almost half of American adults say they personally know someone who has been shot, either accidentally or deliberately. 

A new Pew Research Center poll found that 44 percent of US adults said they personally knew a shooting victim. Of that, 57 percent were African-American, 43 percent were Caucasian, and 42 percent Hispanic.

A higher amount of gun owners, 51 percent, said they knew someone who had been shot, while 40 percent non-owners said they did.

 

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Almost half of American adults say they personally know someone who has been shot, either accidentally or deliberately, according to the Pew Center for Research

 

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African-Americans were more likely to personally know someone who'd been shot, 57 percent compared to 43 percent Caucasians and 42 percent Hispanics; above, residents gather for a vigil against gun violence in Chicago

About 23 percent of Americans said they or someone they knew had been threatened or intimidated by someone with a gun. Of this, about a third of blacks (32 percent) say they had experienced this compared with 20 percent of whites. 

About a quarter of Hispanics (24 percent) say this has happened to them or to someone else in their family.

The survey did not include respondents' age or where the person lived.

The poll quizzed 3,930 adults in March and April. 

Other findings of the 'America's Complex Relationship with Guns' survey included that 30 percent of respondents currently owned a gun, 11 percent did not own a gun but lived with someone who does, and 57 percent lived in a household without any guns.

 

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According to the survey, 51 percent of gun owners said they knew someone who had been shot, while 40 percent non-owners said they did

A majority of gun owners and non-owners thought the greatest contributing factor to gun violence is the ease with which illegal guns can be obtained, with 87 percent non-owners to 83 percent gun owners.  

While gun owners and non-owners were often divided on the topics of gun laws, one thing they mostly agreed on was that the mentally ill should not have access to guns, with 89 percent of both groups saying that mental illness should be a preclusion from owning a gun.

The majority of both groups also agreed that background checks should be done for private gun sales and at gun shows, with 87 percent non-owners and 77 percent gun owners. 

 

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Seventy-seven percent of non-owners think assault-style weapons should be banned, while only 48 percent of gun owners thought so

Seventy-seven percent of non-owners think assault-style weapons should be banned, while only 48 percent of gun owners thought so.

Only one-third of adults said not only did they not own a gun, they could never see themselves doing so.