Sea-Level Rise Risk Communication: Public Understanding, Risk Perception, and Attitudes about Information

Covi, Michelle; Kain, Donna

doi:10.1080/17524032.2015.1056541

Cited by 58 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 60 publications

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“…However, this research and others (e.g. Covi & Kain, 2015) suggest this is not the case. Thus, in messages to the public, scientists need to overtly state the criterial attributes of "good" science and show how their work fits that name.…”

Section: Discussion/conclusionmentioning

confidence: 58%

“…Although public opinion polling about the NC public's perceptions of SLR policy or sea-level rise is lacking, a recent study by Covi and Kain (2015) points to the possible influence of the NC-20's intervention on public interpretations of sea-level rise. They exposed subjects in two coastal NC communities to several different forms of SLR fact sheets to measure the subjects' comprehension and response to the topic.…”

Section: Discussion/conclusionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…They exposed subjects in two coastal NC communities to several different forms of SLR fact sheets to measure the subjects' comprehension and response to the topic. Covi and Kain (2015) found that many subjects were skeptical about some of the information, its sources, or about science in general. They speculated, "The prevalence of comments indicating fatalism, skepticism, and a lack of concern or action to reduce SLR risk in eastern North Carolina may be due to the 'invisible' nature of the hazard" (p. 17).…”

Section: Discussion/conclusionmentioning

confidence: 98%

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Dividing and Uniting Through Naming: The Case of North Carolina's Sea-Level-Rise Policy

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2016

Environmental Communication

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Section: Discussion/conclusionmentioning

confidence: 58%

Section: Discussion/conclusionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Section: Discussion/conclusionmentioning

confidence: 98%

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Dividing and Uniting Through Naming: The Case of North Carolina's Sea-Level-Rise Policy

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2016

Environmental Communication

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“…According to Overpeck et al (2011) this enhanced focus on making climate data accessible to new user groups, who do not possess expert knowledge about climate change or how to interpret climate data, has led to a stronger emphasis on the role of the user and how to represent data in meaningful and useful manners in the development of visual representations of such data. Research points to the issue that, in a context of communication with lay audiences, traditional graphic representations of climate change are generally perceived as abstract and difficult for people to make sense of and relate to (Sheppard 2012;Covi & Kain 2016). Different user groups make use of different meaning-making strategies, and this is particularly salient when comparing expert and non-expert user groups, where scientists, because of their training and experience, have different prerequisites for interpreting information graphics than do lay audiences (Harold et al 2016).…”

Section: Lay Audiences In Climate Visualizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Visualiseringens roller i klimatkommunikation – ett mottagarperspektiv

Ballantyne

2018

Linköping Studies in Arts and Sciences

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Linköping Studies in Arts and Sciences  No. 744 At the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Linköping University, research and doctoral studies are carried out within broad problem areas. Research is organized in interdisciplinary research environments and doctoral studies mainly in graduate schools. Jointly, they publish the series Linköping Studies in Arts and Sciences. This thesis comes from the Department of Thematic Studies-Environmental Change.

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“…Rainfall, storms, and heat waves are expected to become more frequent and intense as a result of climate change [1]. Stakeholders from public, private, and third-sector organizations as well as members of the general public face decisions about how to adapt to these changes [2,3]. To make informed decisions, they need reliable and understandable information about climate change and associated uncertainties [4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Visualizations of Projected Rainfall Change in the United Kingdom: An Interview Study about User Perceptions

Kause

Bruin²,

Fung

et al. 2020

Sustainability

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Stakeholders from public, private, and third sectors need to adapt to a changing climate. Communications about climate may be challenging, especially for audiences with limited climate expertise. Here, we study how such audience members perceive visualizations about projected future rainfall. In semi-structured interviews, we presented 24 participants from climate-conscious organizations across the UK with three prototypical visualizations about projected future rainfall, adopted from the probabilistic United Kingdom Climate Projections: (1) Maps displaying a central estimate and confidence intervals, (2) a line graph and boxplots displaying change over time and associated confidence intervals, and (3) a probability density function for distributions of rainfall change. We analyzed participants' responses using "Thematic Analysis". In our analysis, we identified features that facilitated understanding-such as colors, simple captions, and comparisons between different emission scenarios-and barriers that hindered understanding, such as unfamiliar acronyms and terminology, confusing usage of probabilistic estimates, and expressions of relative change in percentages. We integrate these findings with the interdisciplinary risk communication literature and suggest content-related and editorial strategies for effectively designing visualizations about uncertain climate projections for audiences with limited climate expertise. These strategies will help organizations such as National Met Services to effectively communicate about a changing climate.Sustainability 2020, 12, 2955 2 of 21 probabilistic climate projections about how the UK climate is expected to change over the course of the current century for the UK Climate Projections 2009 (UKCP09) and 2018 (UKCP18) platform [7,8]. These climate projections are simulations of how, for example, precipitation or temperatures might change in response to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere, as well as how likely those changes are.However, climate projections may be challenging for stakeholders from public, private, and third-sector organizations and members of the general public [2,4,[9][10][11]. One potential difficulty in communicating climate projections is their inherent uncertainty [12]. This uncertainty arises from different sources, including natural variability in climate data resulting in imprecision, and uncertainty about how future human activities will impact on the climate, represented through different emission scenarios, or model uncertainty [13][14][15][16][17][18]. Thus, audiences' interpretations of climate projections and associated uncertainties may differ from what climate experts aim to communicate [19,20]. In addition, presenting uncertainty in climate information may delay public action on climate change [21], promote a "wait-and-see" approach [22], or increase public polarization about climate change [23]. This calls for communication formats that allow stakeholders to make adequate adaptation decisions and to integ...

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Sea-Level Rise Risk Communication: Public Understanding, Risk Perception, and Attitudes about Information

Cited by 58 publications

References 60 publications

Dividing and Uniting Through Naming: The Case of North Carolina's Sea-Level-Rise Policy

Dividing and Uniting Through Naming: The Case of North Carolina's Sea-Level-Rise Policy

Visualiseringens roller i klimatkommunikation – ett mottagarperspektiv

Visualizations of Projected Rainfall Change in the United Kingdom: An Interview Study about User Perceptions

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