Ocean Acidification
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Understanding Public Opinion on Climate Change: A Call for Research
Understanding Public Opinion on Climate Change: A Call for Research
Environmental Magazine doi:10.1080/00139157.2011.588555 (2011)
Although there is widespread agreement among scientists regarding the seriousness of anthropogenic global warming, such a consensus has not reached the general public. In fact, the proportion of Americans who accept the realities of climate change has decreased significantly over the last three years even while scientific evidence of the phenomenon has been strengthened.
Scientists often make the assumption that the public uses rational decision making, weighing the positives and negatives of an issue, to form an opinion. The rational choice model is not sufficient to understand public opinion regarding climate change, however, because it would solely attribute the lack of interest in climate change to a lack of knowledge about the phenomenon. For instance, the rational choice model does not explain why, among Republicans, higher levels of educational attainment are not correlated with increased acceptance of global warming.
Instead of the rational choice model, opinions on climate change are increasingly being formed by connecting information about the issue from trustworthy sources to preexisting beliefs and values. As the political environment has become more polarized decisions are being made less on a case by case analysis of costs and benefits. This is supported by the fact that opinions of Democrats and Independents regarding climate change have remained fairly constant while those of self-identified republicans have dropped significantly over the past three years.
This study by Marquart-Pyatt et al. demonstrates that the anemic public interest in climate change cannot solely be attributed to a lack of knowledge about the phenomenon. Instead, it is indicative of a polarized political climate where decisions are made more on political affiliation than rational choice. More research needs to be conducted in order to to understand the mechanism of public opinion.
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What you said about the flaws with the rational choice model is 100% true. It is troubling that beliefs seem to be coming from political parties rather than self knowledge.
The study definitely makes sound sense in its claim public interest in climate change depends on a lot more than solely on knowledge about the phenomenon. Researching on how the public loose hold of their purity in decision making and the capacity of generating original opinions should be quite interesting and should also be dependent of many complicated factors. It may be quite intriguing to figure out to what extents have the public been blinded by the overpowering and contaminated concept of die-hard-loyalty to political parties.
(Corrected)
The study definitely makes sound sense in its claim that public interest in climate change depends on a lot more than solely on knowledge about the phenomenon. Researching on how the public loose hold of their purity in decision making and the capacity of generating original opinions should be quite interesting and should also be dependent of many complicated factors. It may be quite intriguing to figure out to what extents have the public been blinded by the overpowering and contaminated concept of die-hard-loyalty to political parties.