Russians protest in front of the State Duma against pension reform in Moscow in August.
In a survey whose results were published on December 19, two-thirds -- or 66 percent -- of respondents answered "yes" when asked whether they regret the 1991 Soviet collapse.
That is up from 58 percent a year earlier and is the highest proportion since 2004, the last year of President Vladimir Putin's first term, Levada said.
One-quarter of respondents said they do not regret the Soviet breakup, the lowest proportion since 2005, and 9 percent said they could not answer.
Putin, president from 2000-08 and 2012 to the present, has often played up the achievements of the Soviet Union while playing down some of its darkest chapters.
Comment: Leave it to Radio Free Europe to put such a spin on Putin. The Russian president has lauded the achievements of the Soviet Union when it comes to the Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany. A very costly and crucial achievement for the Russian people. But Putin has also been quite vocal in pointing out the Soviet Union's horrible failings as well.
In 2005, Putin called the Soviet breakup the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe" of the 20th century, citing the large numbers of Russians it left outside Russia.
In March, when asked what event in the country's history he would like to have been able to change, he named the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Comment: Of course, but only because of the great instability that was incurred by the Russian people in how it was broken up.
But Levada said that Russians' concerns about their economic security today were among the main reasons for the increase in the number voicing regret.
A highly unpopular plan to raise the retirement age by five years has stoked antigovernment sentiment and pushed Putin's own approval ratings down this year.
The peak of regret over the Soviet collapse came in 2000, when 75 percent of Russian polled by Levada answered "yes" to the same question.
This year, Levada surveyed 1,600 people nationwide in the November 22-28 poll.
The pollster said that 52 percent of respondents named the collapse of the Soviet Union's "single economic system" as the main thing they regretted.
Worries about their current economic situation and prospects were a major factor for many of those respondents, Levada said.
At the same time, 36 percent said they miss the "feeling of belonging to a great power," and 31 percent lamented mistrust and cruelty in society.
With reporting by Vedomosti
USSR was good for both sides of Berlin wall. Democracy in the west felt with The Wall