How personal experience affects perception of and decisions related to climate change: A psychological view

Brügger, Adrian, Demski, Christina ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9215-452X and Capstick, Stuart ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1934-4503 2021. How personal experience affects perception of and decisions related to climate change: A psychological view. Weather, Climate, and Society 13 (3) , pp. 397-408. 10.1175/WCAS-D-20-0100.1

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Abstract

The proportion of the world’s population exposed to above-average monthly temperatures has been rising consistently in recent decades and will continue to grow. This and similar trends make it more likely that people will personally experience extreme weather events and seasonal changes related to climate change. A question that follows from this is to what extent experiences may influence climate-related beliefs, attitudes, and the willingness to act. Although research is being done to examine the effects of such experiences, many of these studies have two important shortcomings. First, they propose effects of experiences but remain unclear on the psychological processes that underlie those effects. Second, if they do make assumptions about psychological processes, they do not typically corroborate them with empirical evidence. In other words, a considerable body of research in this field rests on relatively unfounded intuitions. To advance the theoretical understanding of how experiences of climate change could affect the motivation to act on climate change, we introduce a conceptual framework that organizes insights from psychology along three clusters of processes: 1) noticing and remembering, 2) mental representations, and 3) risk processing and decision-making. Within each of these steps, we identify and explicate psychological processes that could occur when people personally experience climate change, and we formulate theory-based, testable hypotheses. By making assumptions explicit and tying them to findings from basic and applied research from psychology, this paper provides a solid basis for future research and for advancing theory.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Psychology
Publisher:	American Meteorological Society
ISSN:	1948-8327
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	20 July 2021
Date of Acceptance:	17 February 2021
Last Modified:	03 May 2023 17:21
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/139121

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