The China Daily-Gallup survey covered 2,007 members of the general public and 250 opinion leaders in the US. Seven in 10 US respondents said strong relations between the US and China are "somewhat" or "very" important.

Opinion leaders were even more emphatic, as 85 percent said strong relations between the two countries are important.

It also showed that Americans tend to want more bilateral cooperation, especially with economic and energy issues, in addition to cultural, educational, scientific, political and diplomatic cooperation.

Similar results were found in the China Daily-Horizon survey, which polled residents from Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Wuhan, Chengdu, Shenyang and Xi'an, most of which host US embassy or consulates.

More than 90 percent of the Chinese public, regardless of their location, has believed for many years in a row that the Sino-US relationship is important, according to the survey.

In 2011, about half believed the relationship was "very" important, a 20 percent increase from a similar survey by Horizon in 2009.

Nearly 60 percent of Chinese respondents think the bilateral relationship will remain stable in general, and nearly one-fourth believe it will improve.

Yet Chinese citizens' favorability for the US declined in the past two years from the highest level reached between 2006 and 2009, according to Horizon's data in the last decade.

The survey shows "the hegemony by the US on other countries" has become a major factor that affects Chinese citizens' impression toward the US.

About 42 percent of Chinese respondents said the US war on terror, even after Osama bin Laden was killed in May 2011, made their impression of the US worse. That is an increase of nearly 8 percent from the result in 2007 in the midst of the war.

Around 63 percent of respondents said their impression of the US has worsened because of the US intervention in Libya and stance on Syria.

Impressions change

Researchers said changing impressions of the other country reflect the changes in the bilateral relationship. According to the China Daily-Horizon survey, more than half of the respondents said the current China-US relationship is "bad" or "very bad".

In addition to US hegemony, its negative political and economic policies on China are also some of the top factors affecting Chinese citizens' impressions of the US, it showed.

In the China Daily-Gallup survey, Americans are almost evenly split on their overall view of China. Forty-two percent said they have a favorable opinion of China, 44 percent had an unfavorable view and 12 percent said they had neither a favorable nor an unfavorable opinion.

Certain groups were slightly more likely to have favorable views of China, such as African-Americans and Americans between the ages of 18 to 34, the survey found.

Historical view

It is not surprising that there are different views among the US populace on ties with China. From the beginning, the American perception of China has been divided between "acceptance and rejection, admiration and contempt", said Terry Lautz, a visiting professor at Syracuse University and former vice-president of the Henry Luce Foundation.

Historically, Americans have looked at China's rich history and culture with great fascination, but they also treated a weak and disorganized China with much disdain, he said. "American views of China, whether positive or negative, generally have been constructed on an assumption that American values and powers are superior," Lautz said at a recent seminar in Washington DC.

"The notion that China ought to be just like the US was especially nourished by several generations of American missionaries who had vested interests in creating ties that would bind the two cultures together," he said.