How Americans think about Muslims mostly comes from the headlines they read

How Americans perceive Muslims is linked primarily to headlines — which makes sense, because most Americans haven't even spoken to a Muslim in the past year, The Washington Post reports.

According to the Public Religion Research Institute's American Values Survey, which was conducted before the Nov. 13 Paris terror attacks, 56 percent of Americans believe the values of Islam conflict with values of the United States.

However, since the U.S. Muslim population is relatively small — only about 1 percent — and spread out across a handful of cities, many Americans are forming opinions about Islam from a distance. In 2011, seven in 10 Americans said they hadn't even talked to a Muslim in the past year. In 2013, another survey found that a majority of Americans couldn't even locate Syria — a predominantly Muslim country — on a map.

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That's a problem, considering "the act of simply knowing someone from a minority group can be a powerful perception game-changer," The Washington Post reports.

President Obama has also recently condemned the media for its portrayal of Islam. "We will not give in to fear, or start turning on each other, or treating some people differently because of religion or race or background. That's precisely what terrorists like ISIL want, because, ultimately, that's the only way they can win," he said.