NPR’s Ailsa Chang talks with Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert about why the human brain doesn’t respond to threats posed by climate change as quickly or proactively as seems warranted. All Things Considered, NPR Read more »
Americans broadly accept climate science, but many are fuzzy on the details
Americans remain shaky on the details of climate science even as they have grown increasingly concerned about human activity warming the Earth, according to a national poll by The Washington Post and the Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) that probed the public’s understanding of climate change. The rising alarm is one […] Read more »
Climate change and health care reform are top priority issues to Californians likely to vote in the state’s Democratic primary
Eight in ten voters likely to be participating in the state’s March Democratic presidential primary consider climate change and health care reform top priority issues for the next president to address. Another 54% rate immigration reform as a top priority issue, while 30% say this about reforming the nation’s criminal […] Read more »
Most Americans say climate change impacts their community, but effects vary by region
Roughly six-in-ten U.S. adults (62%) say climate change is currently affecting their local community either a great deal or some, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. This finding is consistent with a 2018 Center survey, in which 59% of Americans said global climate change was affecting their local […] Read more »
Party Cues in the News: Elite Opinion Leadership and Climate Skepticism
Supporters of the Republican Party have become much more skeptical of the science of climate change since the 1990s. We argue that this phenomenon can be explained by a model of top-down persuasion by party elites. We construct aggregate measures of climate skepticism from nearly 200 public opinion polls at […] Read more »
Americans like Green New Deal’s goals, but they reject paying trillions to reach them
Ever since Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) introduced it last February, the Green New Deal has sparked a rancorous political debate about what exactly should be done to combat ever-worsening climate change. But outside of Washington, few know much about it. In a nationwide public […] Read more »