May 27, 2022 17:00:00

6% of Americans believe they could beat a bear with their bare hands

A survey by YouGov, a market research and online survey company, found that a significant portion of Americans believe they could defeat wild animals such as bears, lions, and elephants with their bare hands.

Rumble in the jungle: what animals would win in a fight? | YouGov

https://today.yougov.com/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2021/05/13/lions-and-tigers-and-bears-what-animal-would-win-f

Which animals could Britons beat in a fight? | YouGov
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2021/05/21/which-animals-could-britons-beat-fight

YouGov conducted a survey of 1,224 Americans aged 18 and over on April 12-13, 2021, asking whether they would be able to fight various animals with their bare hands and win.

The results are as follows: The animal most likely to be defeated by respondents was a rat (72%), followed by a domestic cat (69%) and a goose (61%). Also, 8% of Americans boasted that they could beat a wild animal such as a gorilla, elephant, or lion with their bare hands, and even the lowest percentage, a grizzly bear, was thought to be beatable by only 6% of people.

Regarding this result, YouGov commented, 'Whether it's overconfidence or recklessness, 6% of people think they could take down a grizzly bear like

Hugh Glass , played by Leonardo DiCaprio, in the movie ' The Revenant, ' although Glass used a dagger instead of his bare hands.'

There was almost no difference between men and women in terms of the likelihood of beating a wild animal. The graph below shows the percentage of people who answered 'I could beat him' broken down by gender. There were some animals, such as medium-sized dogs (60% men vs. 39% women) where there was a 21-point difference between men and women, and some animals, such as king cobras (23% vs. 8%) where one-third as many women thought they could beat them compared to men, but there was only a one-point difference for gorillas, elephants, lions, and grizzly bears. Moreover, more women than men thought they could beat lions.

When YouGov asked the same question to British people, the number of people who felt confident they could defeat wild animals dropped overall, but 2% still thought they could defeat a grizzly bear or an elephant.