FOX Poll: Love Is in the Air

NEW YORK – Ah, Valentine’s Day (search). It’s definitely a warm and fuzzy holiday, as most Americans say they plan to celebrate the day this year and a majority says they look forward to Valentine’s Day. Fewer than 1-in-10 Americans say they dread the day, according to the latest FOX News poll.

By more than three to one, Americans plan to celebrate Valentine’s Day this year — 75 percent say they will celebrate and 21 percent will "ignore" the holiday.

The poll finds that respondents living in "red states" (which gave their 2004 electoral votes to Republican George W. Bush (search)), are much more likely than those living in "blue states" (that went for Democrat John Kerry (search)) to be interested in Valentine’s Day. Fully 85 percent of those living in the red states plan to celebrate on Monday compared to 60 percent in the blue states.

Opinion Dynamics Corporation conducted the national telephone poll of 900 registered voters for FOX News on February 8-9.

In addition, a clear majority of the public says they look forward to Valentine’s Day. Six times as many say they look forward to the day of flowers-and-candy as say they dread it (63 percent and 7 percent respectively). Twenty-eight percent take a middle-of-the-road "neutral" position on the holiday.

No gender gap here — the poll finds roughly equal numbers of men (62 percent) and women (64 percent) look forward to Valentine’s Day; however, there is a significant marriage gap. Married people are 18 percentage points more likely than those who are unmarried to say they look forward to cupid’s day. Moreover, unmarried men are twice as likely as married men to say they "dread" it.

"Obviously if you’re single and don’t want to be, Valentine’s Day highlights your problem in a major way," comments Opinion Dynamics President John Gorman. "And, if you’re a single man who has a girlfriend who wants marriage, the day presents a whole other set of pitfalls."

On this lovers’ holiday, a slim majority of Americans (54 percent) say they believe in love at first sight, up from 49 percent in 2001, but down from a high of 59 percent in February 2000.

• Pdf: Click here for full poll results.