Climate change risk perceptions and the problem of scale: evidence from cross-national survey experiments

Abstract

This paper examines the concept of spatial optimism, defined as the tendency for individuals to perceive climate change as less threatening to themselves than to people in geographically more distant locations. Existing studies find mixed evidence of this phenomenon, while the methods employed often fail to rule out confounding factors. To resolve these empirical and methodological tensions, the paper presents results from a survey experiment fielded in nine countries spanning Europe, North America, and Asia. The survey finds that respondents systematically perceive climate change as a greater threat to the world than to themselves, in nine countries. However, while groups that may be considered more vulnerable to climate change often display higher levels of perceived overall risk, the survey finds evidence of spatial bias to be systematic across and within cases. Future research should apply this measurement strategy in more vulnerable countries and over time.

Insights from early COVID-19 responses about promoting sustainable action

“…They invoke a personal responsibility and moral obligation to take prosocial action 8,9 , which seems just the kind of action that is needed to mitigate global crises. Specifically, many people feel that primarily others rather than themselves are impacted by global crises, including COVID-19 6,7 and global environmental crises like climate change and pollution 10,11 . Hence, individual responses to global crises seem to involve prosocial actions 12 : actions that are believed as primarily having benefits for others and society, while having limited personal benefits, and sometimes even having substantial personal costs.…”

Climate concerned but anti-nuclear: Exploring (dis)approval of nuclear energy in four European countries

“…In the UK, there are no significant differences between the different age groups. In France, groups of higher ageexcept for ages 45-54 -tend to regard nuclear energy more positively than the reference group (age [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24], while in Norway the opposite is the case. In Germany, it is only the age groups 45-54, 55-64, and 65+ that consider nuclear energy to be more acceptable than does the reference group.…”

“…Public concern about climate change often takes lower priority than other issues of public attention, such as a nation's overall economic situation, unemployment or most recently, migration policies, which people perceive to be more immediate risks and challenges. Scholars attribute this to the psychologically distant character of climate change, asserting that direct personal experience is a crucial factor in people's attention and concern [19][20][21][22][23]. Surveys show that concern about climate change has been increasing over the last two decades globally [24][25][26][27][28] and that knowledge about the causes of climate change has been increasing as well [29].…”

Public attitudes towards climate change: A cross-country analysis

“…First, we show that perceived threats from climate change have positive effects on climate change concern. Second, some researchers pointed out that climate change is perceived usually as a threat to distant people and places than to one’s self here and now (Schultz et al, 2014; Tvinnereim et al, 2020). Our findings demonstrate that when climate change is perceived as a threat to the self and the immediate family, it has stronger effects on climate change concern.…”