Climate Change In The American Mind with Anthony Leiserowitz

Anthony Leiserowitz

Last night I attended a guest lecture titled Climate Change in the American Mind, with Director of the Yale Project on Climate Change, Anthony Leiserowitz, Ph. D. The event housed here at the University of Oregon in the very environmentally friendly building, the Many Nations Longhouse. The U of O is a familiar place for Leiserowitz, a few years back he received his Masters and Ph. D here. Among many, he is recognized as an expert on climate change and public opinion, both American and internationally and has been an adviser to many public policy officials.

Many Nations Longhouse at the University of Oregon

Opening his talk, he illustrated the issue of misunderstanding of climate science and the question of why some people are very interested about the issue and why others are much less so. Basing off three major pillars of consumer behavior, social norms, and political behaviors he continued to explain his process of research, and from that research over many years, a model of outreach. Highlights of outreach including the media, individual journalists, weather-casters, and regular folk perspectives.

Looking back over the past decade or so, there has been a generally moderate level of belief that climate change has occurred and is continuing, but then a sudden drop in 2010, and since then belief has still not been back up to periods prior. Leiserowitz likens this to the proceedings of the tobacco debates many years ago and that many Americans feel climate change is less about themselves as Americans, but much more as a distant issue. This phenomenon he mentions is a key point; that there is a disassociation of the issue between every day Americans and the effects along with solutions of climate change.

In 2010, Leiserowitz points to a perfect storm of issues that caused this sudden decline in public opinion towards climate change. The five major sources coming from the 1) economic recession, 2) declining media coverage, 3) unusually cold weather, 4) an effective denial industry, 5) "climategate" (wikipedia article). Many of these issues were propagated through a very strong message of denial through the rise of the Tea Party and Republican control of the House of Representatives.

Leiserowitz Speaking at the U of O

The next point he wanted to make is that there are multiple forms of nay-sayers. All of which have different reasons. Further that he describes there are Six Types of Americans with respect to climate change. First there are the alarmed, people who are very nervous about the potential affects of climate change who represent 12% of the population. Next, there are the concerned, people who are concerned but not very nervous, 27% of people. Then the cautious, representing 25%. The next three personifying the deniers, with disengaged (10%), doubtful (15%), and dismissive (10%). What is key here to note Leiserowitz says, is that while there are more people towards the attentive side, the firmly convinced minority of dismissive individuals are very loud "soap boxers" and are well representing in congress along with the media.

When he asked the crowd, which was almost bursting outside of the medium sized room, what the first image was when they heard the term climate change or global warming, overwhelmingly (including  myself) pictured ice melting. From his research, he has found that this is the most common image in the American mind and it is one that creates a problem. "How many people here live or have been to Antartica?" he asked us. No one had raised their hands. "There is the problem, this reinforces the distant association of the issue. Americans don't associate the positive feedback effects or the connections of the issues." 

O-Zone Hole Model

Much of this he claims are due to the progression of climate and environmental issues in the American mindset. For example, over the three past decades, Americans and the world have looked at solving the O-Zone Layer Depletion as a being a first step in global environmental preservation. People have been subjected to new problem after another, with little time in between. Thus they are collected and blend together each of these different issues. For example, many people incorrectly associate O-Zone depletion with climate change, even though they are separate issues. Furthermore, O-Zone Depletion has a simple mental model that comes along with it.  Something that climate change does not have is this simple mental model. It is a hard system to depict in the mind. There are the shocking aspects of seeing a polar bear on a single piece of ice, but it is harder to connect the systems of a warming planet to increases in disease around the world. Interestingly, very few, to almost no one associates the connection climate change has to the impact of human health. Instead, simply put, most people do not connect the dots and have a very just about polar bears mindset.

Shocking Image of Climate Change

Leiserowitz points to how there is a significant difference between the egalitarian mindset, one that favors the equality among living entities, and the individualism present in American culture. Interestingly enough, the most important issue to the individualism mindset is the demand for freedom and independence of fossil fuels and of foreign based energy sources. When asked if this mindset is present in other nations around the world, Leiserowitz cites that the four most common places, Canada, the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia, all have two things in common; all are of ruggard frontier mindsets (minus the U.K.) and are English speaking. Does this translate perfectly, he was not willing to say definitively, but merely suggested some link in ideology.

In conclusion, Leiserowitz suggests a few ideas towards the future with climate change. First, a diverse support of the population is needed, not just from a few politicians, concerned citizens, and scientists, but that many more people need to form a silent majority of sorts, that support their electorate to make decisions that will be rewarded. Next, to recognize that many people who are very strongly in support of addressing the issue live in bubbles. Noting that here in Eugene, we are a sub-culture of super green fanatics, and that this is not something seen in other places around the United States. For example, when I was in New Orleans working on a post hurricane Katrina service project, I never came across recycling stations or really anything of the concept. Finally, that knowledge is necessary but insufficient, rather that we need societal demands and actions of change rather than individual ones.

If you would like to learn more about Anthony Leiserowitz and his work surrounding climate change and public opinion, please follow the link below to his profile at Yale and his web-site. Also, be sure to watch the video below, where Leiserowitz explains the Six Types of Americans. 

Leiserowitz on the Six Types of Americans: 





Additional Links:

Profile:
http://environment.yale.edu/profile/leiserowitz/

Yale Project on Climate Change Communication Homepage:
http://environment.yale.edu/climate/