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Fear Doesn't Work and Other Lessons on Climate Change Communication

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Fear Doesn't Work and Other Lessons on Climate Change Communication FEAR DOESN'T WORK AND OTHER LESSONS ON CLIMATE CHANGE COMMUNICATION Photo: Farshad Usyan CONT ENTS 02 INTRODUCTION 14 CASE STUDY 1: Why has it been difficult to COMMUNICATION communicate climate science and climate change? IS SURVIVAL A look at how communication is a matter of survival in the case of 03 WHAT AFFECTS the Philippines and typhoon COMMUNICATION Haiyan Psychology on how people process information, and how it can affect how people view climate change 17 CASE STUDY 2: COMMUNICATION 06 HOW TO INFLUENCING COMMUNICATE POLICY CLIMATE CHANGE A look at how communication can help influence international Includes knowing your audience, climate policy as in the case of the framing your message, use of "1.5 to Stay Alive" campaign emotional appeal, and communicating uncertainty Photo: Farshad Usyan INTRODUCTION WHY HAS IT BEEN DIFFICULT TO COMMUNICATE CLIMATE SCIENCE AND CLIMATE CHANGE? What do people think when they hear At times, technical terms are being the words “climate change?” Too relayed to the public without scientific, too complicated? And How sufficient explanation, or climate data do they feel? Fear, skepticism, or are still being presented without hope? What images do they see? Polar enough context. When these happen, bears, glaciers, and typhoons? the public tends to draw away, feeling detached from the issue. However, as Climate change has been a challenge we will learn later, climate change for both the scientific community and communication is very important, and the media. There seems to be gap in some cases, may become a matter between the science and what is of survival. being communicated to the public. This has, of course, an impact on So what makes climate change whether or not people will care about communication effective? According the issue and choose to take action, or to the Center for Research on not. Environmental Decisions (CRED), “in order for climate science information According to Susanne Moser and Lisa to be fully absorbed by audiences, it Dilling, making people act on climate must be actively communicated with change has become challenging appropriate language, metaphor, and because of a few things: “the analogy; combined with narrative characteristics of climate change storytelling; made vivid through itself, its politicization and visual imagery and experiential institutionalization, cognitive and scenarios; balanced with scientific psychological ways of processing information; and delivered by trusted information, structural challengers messengers in group settings.” pertaining to the media used for communication.” This seems quite overwhelming, but don’t worry, we made this toolkit for Climate communications still seems you to help break down what is to be a problem among scientists and effective climate change journalists alike. communication and give you practical tips on how to do it. Ready? P A G E 2 WHAT AFFECTS COMMUNICATION? P S Y C H O L O G Y O N H O W P E O P L E P R O C E S S I N F O R M A T I O N There are many things that affect climate change communication, not just in terms of media platforms and how the message is relayed to the public, but it is also important to understand how the receiver of the message processes information. C O N F I R M A T I O N B I A S The person you are talking to already have their set of values and beliefs. According to CRED, confirmation bias “makes people look for information that is consistent with what they “Confirmation bias ultimately turns into already think, want, or feel, leading them to ‘motivated reasoning,’ an emotion-based avoid, dismiss, or forget information that will decision-making process in which people to require them to change their minds and, quite cling to false beliefs and ignore any opposing possibly, their behavior.” evidence,” Gregoire said In short, for climate deniers, it doesn’t matter Can anything be done about this? Fortunately, that there is 97% scientific consensus on man- yes. According to CRED, people will eventually made climate change. They will look for update their existing beliefs and perceptions by information that will instead align to what they correcting misinformation. The catch? already know and what they believe in. Communicators must be able to figure out the misconceptions of their audience on climate According to Carolyn Gergoire, people want to change, disconnect this misinformation, and avoid cognitive dissonance with confirmation replace it with new facts. However, too much bias. Dissonance is where people have facts can also backfire. So other tactics must be inconsistency in thoughts and beliefs, which employed if we are to communicate climate creates tension, especially if it requires change to climate skeptics and convince others changing behaviors. to believe in the science. P A G E 3 WHAT AFFECTS COMMUNICATION? P S Y C H O L O G Y O N H O W P E O P L E P R O C E S S I N F O R M A T I O N B A C K F I R E E F F E C T So now we know that people will only continue to believe what they already believe in, and that they will only choose to process information that already confirms their biases. This may also lead to people only getting more information to prove themselves and end up believing in it stronger than they already do. This is called the “backfire effect.” According to Skeptical Science, there are two According to a study from Dartmouth, “If people ways to deal with this: present information counterargue unwelcome information coupled with self-affirmation; and second, vigorously enough, they may end up with 'more frame it in a way that doesn’t threaten their attitudinally congruent information in mind world views. We’ll have more on framing than before the debate,' which in turn leads messages in the second part of this toolkit. them to report opinions that are more extreme than they otherwise would have had." Be careful though, it is not only climate skeptics or climate deniers who have confirmation bias David McRaney summarizes the backfire effect and experience backfire effect. Even advocates simply, “Once something is added to your can have them too. collection of beliefs, you protect it from harm. You do it instinctively and unconsciously when If climate skeptics use the argument that confronted with attitude-inconsistent climate change isn’t real because it’s still information. Just as confirmation bias shields snowing where they live, advocates must be you when you actively seek information, the careful not to connect every weather related backfire effect defends you when the event, such as El Nino and typhoons, to climate information seeks you, when it blindsides you. change. The urge to use everything to our own Coming or going, you stick to your beliefs advantage to help the cause will only lead to instead of questioning them. When someone more misunderstanding and tries to correct you, tries to dilute your miscommunication, and only widens the gap misconceptions, it backfires and strengthens between the science and the public’s them instead.” understanding of it. P A G E 4 Photo: Farshad Usyan A. KNOWING YOUR AUDIENCE HOW TO AND FRAMING YOUR MESSAGE COMMUNICATE You will read many articles on the how communicating climate change (or any other issue), and most will tell you that an important CLIMATE thing to understand is to know your audience and frame your message accordingly. How you communicate climate change to university CHANGE students might be different to how you communicate it to policy makers. S o h o w t h e n c a n w e c o m m u n i c a t e c l i m a t e Framing is actually quite a common practice c h a n g e ? W h a t a r e t h e e f f e c t i v e w a y s t o in media. For example, when you hear news r e a c h t h e p u b l i c a n d m a k e o u r a u d i e n c e about the latest rise in temperatures during summer, you will read articles about it in u n d e r s t a n d o u r m e s s a g e b e t t e r ? different frames: how it can affect health, how it can affect food security, how it can affect your everyday life with decrease in water supply. N O M A D I C | 2 4 Another example would be communicating the importance of renewable energy, such as solar energy to help curb global warming — for businessmen and the energy sector, one can frame the message in the lines of how solar energy makes sense for the economy and how it will be the future of the energy sector; for workers in coal- fired plants, one can frame the message saying that solar plants give more jobs and will not risk worker's health. This is what you call framing, and most people already frame information unintentionally, because of the contexts they live in. Journalists also frame news so that it can relate more to the audience. However, Matthew Nisbet warns us that framing doesn’t mean spinning news: “Framing, it should be noted, is not synonymous with placing a false spin on an issue, although some experts, Photo: Farshad Usyan advocates, journalists, and policymakers certainly spin evidence and facts.” RELEVANT QUESTIONS TO ASK In choosing how to frame your message, it might be useful to ask the following questions about your audience: What are their demographics? Are they old or young? What level of education have they attained? What do they do in their everyday lives? Do they experience climate change impacts directly? Do they see it first hand? What do they care about? Do they care about the future? Or do they care more about what’s happening in the present? Who do they listen to? Do they listen more to authority figures or do they distrust them? Where do they get their information? Do they get it from news sources or do they get information from other people close by like neighbors and family members? P A G E 6 Photo: Farshad Usyan "Framing, it should be noted, is not synonymous with placing a false spin on an issue, although some experts, advocates, journalists, and policymakers certainly spin evidence and facts.” -Matthew Nisbet Photo by: AG Sano According to Climate Outreach, Has there been any unsuccessful A.
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