Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, NY, USA.
Department of Cognition, Emotion, and Methods in Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria.
Nat Commun. 2024 May 8;15(1):3885. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-48112-8.
A major barrier to climate change mitigation is the political polarization of climate change beliefs. In a global experiment conducted in 60 countries (N = 51,224), we assess the differential impact of eleven climate interventions across the ideological divide. At baseline, we find political polarization of climate change beliefs and policy support globally, with people who reported being liberal believing and supporting climate policy more than those who reported being conservative (Cohen's d = 0.35 and 0.27, respectively). However, we find no evidence for a statistically significant difference between these groups in their engagement in a behavioral tree planting task. This conceptual-behavioral polarization incongruence results from self-identified conservatives acting despite not believing, rather than self-identified liberals not acting on their beliefs. We also find three interventions (emphasizing effective collective actions, writing a letter to a future generation member, and writing a letter from the future self) boost climate beliefs and policy support across the ideological spectrum, and one intervention (emphasizing scientific consensus) stimulates the climate action of people identifying as liberal. None of the interventions tested show evidence for a statistically significant boost in climate action for self-identified conservatives. We discuss implications for practitioners deploying targeted climate interventions.
气候变化缓解的一个主要障碍是气候变化信仰的政治两极化。在在 60 个国家进行的一项全球实验中（N=51224），我们评估了十一项气候干预措施在意识形态分歧中的不同影响。在基线时，我们发现全球范围内气候变化信仰和政策支持存在政治两极化，自认为自由派的人比自认为保守派的人更相信和支持气候政策（科恩的 d 分别为 0.35 和 0.27）。然而，我们没有发现这些群体在参与行为植树任务方面有统计学上显著差异的证据。这种概念-行为的极化不和谐是由于自认为保守派的人在不相信的情况下采取了行动，而不是自认为自由派的人没有根据自己的信仰采取行动。我们还发现三项干预措施（强调有效的集体行动、给未来一代成员写信、以及从未来自我写信）可以提高整个意识形态领域的气候信仰和政策支持，而一项干预措施（强调科学共识）可以刺激自认为自由派的人的气候行动。没有一项测试的干预措施显示出对自认为保守派的人在气候行动方面有统计学上显著的促进作用。我们讨论了针对特定气候干预措施的实施者的影响。
