Regular readers know Iโm pretty critical of the United Nationsโ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changeโparticularly when it comes to how this expert body communicates climate science. Basically, my view is that any organization that holds a key climate meeting in Copenhagen in winter is pretty clueless about the politics and public perception of this issue. [See Correction Below.] But even worse is that IPCC has shown far too little investment in communication or public outreach (although lately that is beginning to change), and has handled crisis communication momentsโlike the Himalayan glaciers flapโterribly.
Now, before I get too many ticked off emails: I know the IPCC is the leading expert source for climate science assessments, and deservedly so. I know that the scientists who volunteer to work on its reports do a heroic job. I recognize and commend all of this. But it simply isnโt enough in this day and ageโand it is in the communications sphere where the IPCCโs scientific excellence simply has not been matched.
A new paper in the scientific literature that studies major scientific assessment reports, and their public impact, supports this view. The study in Climatic Change, by Brenda Ekwurzel and Peter Frumhoff of the Union of Concerned Scientists and James McCarthy of Harvard, shows that IPCC-related scandals have received a dramatic level of press attention, coming in second only to IPCC reports themselves in media attention. Furthermore, the paper also suggests that these reports are written in technical language that is likely misinterpreted by publicย audiences.
The new study shows that when IPCC releases one of its rare and treasured assessment reports, it does get more coverage than other assessment reports released by, say, the National Academy of Sciences or the U.S. government. Thatโs very appropriate: The IPCC is, after all, the gold standard and its reports are long awaited and endlesslyย cited.
But consider: The IPCC related โcontroversyโ of late 2009 and early 2010 drew about 1/3 as much total coverage as the 2007 IPCC release of its Fourth Assessment Report, and more total coverage than the release of key assessment reports by the U.S. government and National Academy of Sciences. And I would argue that even this comparison is misleading. Anyone observing politics in this country would have to concede that the IPCC โscandalsโ have been far more influential than the IPCCโs science, at least over the past halfย decade.
The new study also looks at how the IPCC communicates its findings: i.e., in technical language thatโs likely to be misunderstood. Forย instance:
When presented with excerpted sentences from the AR4, survey respondents consistently underestimated the certainty implied by extremes, such as โvery likelyโ (>90% probability, according to the guidelines) and โvery unlikelyโ (<10%). Twenty-five per cent of respondents, for example, interpreted โvery likely,โ as in โaverage Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the second half of the 20th century were very likely higher than during any other 50-year period in the last 500 yearsโ (IPCC 2007), as meaning less than 70% probabilityโฆThus, IPCC terminology intended to succinctly represent authorsโ consensus on the range of probabilities associated with key findings may itself be a significant barrier to understanding for public and policymakerย audiences.
The IPCCโs โlikely/very likelyโ language represents a group of scientists trying to use ordinary language to quantify uncertainty. The goal has always been to be as accurate as possibleโbut how these word choices strike people has been a far less prominent consideration. In other words, IPCC has been communicating for scientists, rather than for audiences.
A new report shows that from 2007 to 2011, the U.S. public showed a 14 % decline in its concern about global warming. Thatโs a period that was kicked off by an IPCC report announcing that โmostโ of the global warming weโve seen is โvery likelyโ caused by humanย activities.
Which pretty much says itย all.
Correction: The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, not the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, organized the Copenhagen summit. My apology for thisย mistake.
