Guns and Perceptions of Safety Among US Women

Prior research found differences in the perceived safety benefits from firearm exposure among diverse gun owners. More women have bought firearms in recent years, resulting in a growing proportion of women who own guns.

To examine differences in perceptions of safety among US women, including women who personally own firearms.

This descriptive survey study used data from the nationally representative National Survey of Gun Policy, fielded January 6 to 24, 2025. Participants included members of the AmeriSpeak panel who were invited to, and completed, the survey (survey completion rate, 69.8%; N = 2977) online or by telephone in English or Spanish. This study focused specifically on women respondents.

Women respondents were stratified by whether they personally owned a gun, lived in a home with a gun that did not belong to them, or had no guns in the home.

The main outcome was differences in respondents affirming whether "personally owning a gun will make me safer" and "I would feel safer if more people were allowed to legally carry guns." These perceptions were also examined across racial and ethnic subgroups of gun-owning women and by whether protection in or out of the home were important reasons for ownership. Differences were assessed using survey-weighted logistic regression models.

A total of 1411 women completed the survey. The mean (SE) age of women respondents was 48.4 (0.6) years; 12.8% self-identified as non-Hispanic Black, 17.4% as Hispanic, 60.3% as non-Hispanic White, and 9.5% as non-Hispanic other race. Overall, 41.1% (95% CI, 37.7%-44.4%) of women affirmed that personally owning a gun would make them safer, and 21.3% (95% CI, 18.5%-24.0%) agreed they would feel safer if more people were allowed to legally carry guns. Affirmations were significantly higher among gun-owning women (69.7% [95% CI, 63.0%-76.3%] and 35.3% [95% CI, 28.6%-42.0%], respectively), compared with those living in homes with guns (48.9% [95% CI, 40.6%-57.1%] and 22.2% [95% CI, 15.1%-29.3%]) and gun-free homes (26.0% [95% CI, 22.5%-29.6%] and 14.8% [95% CI, 11.9%-17.8%]). Among gun owners, agreement with perceived safety gains from ownership ranged from 63.2% (95% CI, 36.7%-89.8%) among non-Hispanic other to 72.6% (95% CI, 56.1%-89.1%) among Hispanic respondents, and perceived safety from others carrying from 20.1% (95% CI, 9.4%-30.9%) among Black to 40.5% (95% CI, 13.4%-67.6%) among non-Hispanic other respondents, with no significant differences by racial and ethnic groups. There were no significant differences when comparing those who did vs did not report that protection in the home or out of the home were important reasons for ownership.

In this survey study of US women, more than half of overall respondents perceived they would not feel safer with greater exposure to firearms, although results varied by personal gun ownership. As gun ownership diversifies, these findings highlight the importance of attending to perceptions of safety in discussions of interventions to reduce gun violence.