Deadlines may be effective in building support for climate change action


Date:
September 2, 2021
Source:
University of Central Florida
Summary:
Human-caused climate change -- including increased extreme
weather and climate events -- is here, according to the UN IPCC
2021 report, but the best way to communicate the concern is still
debated. Deadline messaging has been criticized as causing people
to feel hopelessness, despair and disengagement. However, a new
study finds that this deadline messaging may be effective after all.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Human-caused climate change -- including increased extreme weather and
climate events -- is here, according to the recently released United
Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2021 report, but the
best way to communicate the concern is still debated.


==========================================================================
The panel's previous report in 2018 was widely reported by media as
setting a 12-year deadline of 2030 to turn things around and start
reducing the planet's temperature before the Earth reaches a tipping
point of no-return. This messaging was sometimes criticized, including by
the 2018 IPCC report's authors, as causing people to feel hopelessness,
despair and disengagement.

However, a new University of Central Florida study in the journal
Environmental Communication finds that this deadline messaging may be
effective after all.

In an experiment involving more than 1,000 participants from an online Qualtrics panel, the study's authors found that using "deadline-ism"
messaging increased perceptions of the threat of climate change and
support for making climate change a government priority. Qualtrics is
a U.S.-based research company.

Critics of the 12-year "deadline-ism" message argued it would have a counterproductive influence, resulting in despair and disengagement,
says the study's lead author, Patrice Kohl, an assistant professor in
UCF's Nicholson School of Communication and Media.

"Communication scholars often propose portraying climate change in more proximate terms could play an important role in engaging audiences by
making climate change more personally relevant," Kohl says. "We did not
find any evidence of deadline-ism resulting in disengagement or other counterproductive responses. Our results more closely align with arguments
in favor of presenting climate change in more proximate terms." For the
study, the researchers randomly assigned participants to one of two experimental groups or a control group. Participants in the experimental
groups read one of two versions of a news article about climate change,
one that gave a deadline for taking meaningful climate change action
or one that referred to a deadline but then refuted it. Participants in
the control group did not read any article.



========================================================================== Rather than be disengaged, the researchers found that participants who
read the deadline article significantly supported more political action
to mitigate climate change than those in the control condition.

These participants also perceived the severity of climate change as
greater than those in the control group and they also had a greater sense
that they, individually and collectively, could do something about it.

Perceived ability to do something about climate change, individually and collectively, was also greater in the no-deadline group than the control
group, perhaps because the article refutes the idea of an expiration
date for meaningful climate change action to reduce impacts -- that any
action, at any time, makes a difference, Kohl says.

But only the deadline article group also resulted in greater support
for political climate change action than the control condition.

"As the recent IPCC report illustrates, we're going to have to learn
how to talk about tough climate change realities in ways that engage
rather than disengage audiences," Kohl says. "I understand why critics
worry that the idea of a deadline for meaningful action in avoiding catastrophic climate change might cause people to throw up their hands
in defeat. But our research suggests that assumption might not be quite
right." The study's co-author was Neil Stenhouse, research director
with the Organizing Empowerment Project in Washington, D.C.

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by
University_of_Central_Florida. Original written by Robert Wells. Note:
Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Patrice A. Kohl, Neil Stenhouse. 12 Years Left: How a Climate Change
Action Deadline Influences Perceptions and Engagement. Environmental
Communication, 2021; 1 DOI: 10.1080/17524032.2021.1941175 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/09/210902124932.htm

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