Source: Community Science
Most people in the United States have access to clean, affordable tap water, yet many still choose to drink bottled water at home for reasons including the perception of contaminants, unpleasant taste or smell, and a distrust of institutions. The costs of drinking bottled water can be high for both consumers’ pocketbooks and the environment, so knowing more about how people across the country think about their tap water is valuable.
O’Brien et al. use a community-based participatory science approach to learn more about the water habits and attitudes of residents of Evanston, Ill., a midsize city just north of Chicago on the shores of Lake Michigan. Unlike other research about trust in water in the United States, the authors chose a relatively high income setting for their study, probing how socioeconomic status could affect views of water quality. Using a survey that included both multiple-choice and open-ended questions, as well as follow-up interviews with selected participants, they looked into the reasons for trust, or the lack thereof, in different sources of water.
The researchers found that race and gender were the two most important predictors of trust in tap water. Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) respondents were 3.4 times more likely to distrust tap water than white respondents, and men were 44% less likely than women to distrust tap water. They also found that 92.6% of respondents used tap water as their primary source of drinking water, and 55.6% treated it. More than 40% of Black respondents used bottled water compared with 5.4% of white respondents, and a third of unhoused respondents used bottled water versus 6.8% of those with some form of housing.
Concerns about contamination were the chief reason for distrust in tap water, followed by worries about the taste, smell, or appearance of tap water and chemicals used in treatment. Follow-up interviews found that a general lack of trust in the government, as well as previous adverse experiences with water (including some indirectly related to drinking water quality, such as flooding, water shutoffs, and swimming), were also associated with lower trust levels.
To improve trust in tap water, the authors recommend solutions beyond engineering, including increasing access to at-home water testing and improving communication and education around water treatment procedures and water quality. (Community Science, https://doi.org/10.1029/2024CSJ000090, 2025)
—Nathaniel Scharping (@nathanielscharp), Science Writer
Citation: Scharping, N. (2025), Trust in Evanston tap water depends on gender, race, and past experiences, Eos, 106,https://doi.org/10.1029/2025EO250070. Published on 17 March 2025.
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