A new survey shows voters in the United States struggle to identify Iran when presented with a world map.
Only 23% of registered voters could spot Iran on a map of the world, according to Morning Consult/Politico polling data released Wednesday. When presented with a map of just the Middle East, 28% of respondents could properly identify Iran.
The survey found that men were almost twice as likely as women to identify Iran, with 38% of men correctly identifying the country on a map of the Middle East, while only 20% of women were able to do the same.
The results come as tensions between Iran and the U.S. escalated after the U.S. killed the country’s top general last week in response to Iranian-backed protesters attacking the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. The survey was conducted among 1,995 registered voters from Jan. 4-5, days before Iran retaliated by firing missiles at U.S. military sites in Iraq early Wednesday local time.
Iran is the second-largest country in the Middle East, by landmass, behind Saudi Arabia and one of the three most populous countries in the region with a population of just over 80 million people.
