Americans More Worried About Global Warming Than Climate Change: Yale Study

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Scientists, politicians, environmentalists and journalists have long been stymied by the difficult task of engaging people so that they will agree to begin curbing toxic greenhouse gasย emissions.

Some people deny โ€” out of fear or vested interests โ€” that there are increased levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere, some say if there is a problem it isnโ€™t caused by humans and some just donโ€™t seem toย care.

A U.S. study, Whatโ€™s in a name: Global warming versus climate change (PDF), released last week has found, however, that confusion over language is another reason for a lack of concerted action to deal with what United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says is the greatest threat to humankind.

There is a huge difference in how Americans regard the terms โ€œglobal warmingโ€ and โ€œclimate change,โ€ according to a 31-page report by the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication and the George Mason University Centre for Climate Change Communications.

The report states that โ€œglobal warmingโ€ and โ€œclimate changeโ€ also โ€œactivate different sets of beliefs, feelings, and behaviors, as well as different degrees of urgency about the need toย respond.โ€

The academics found that the term โ€œglobal warmingโ€ is associated with greater public understanding, emotional engagement and support for personal and national action than the term โ€œclimateย change.โ€

The report said that using the term โ€œglobal warmingโ€ is associated with greater certainty that the phenomenon is happening and more intense worry about the issue. It also suggests that โ€œglobal warmingโ€ conjures up much more severe images than โ€œclimateย change.โ€

โ€œOverall, Americans are +13 percentage points more likely to say that global warming is a ‘bad thingโ€™ (76%) than climate change (63%),โ€ the report noted. โ€œIn particular, they are +10 points more likely to say global warming is a โ€˜very bad thingโ€™ (33%) than climate change (23%). By contrast, Americans are +12 points more likely to perceive climate change as a good thing (33%) than global warmingย (21%).

In addition, the report noted that the two phrases have been used by politicians to advance certainย positions.

โ€œPrior to the 2002 mid-term elections, Frank Luntz, a Republican pollster and strategist, gave the George W. Bush administration the following advice in a secret memo about how to win the โ€˜environmental communications battle,โ€™ including global warming,โ€ the reportย said.

Luntzโ€™s recommendation to Republicans was to use the term climate change instead of globalย warming:

โ€œItโ€™s time for us to start talking about โ€˜climate changeโ€™ instead of global warmingโ€ฆโ€˜climate changeโ€™ is less frightening than โ€˜global warming.โ€™ As one focus group participant noted, climate change โ€˜sounds like youโ€™re going from Pittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale.โ€™ While global warming has catastrophic connotations attached to it, climate change suggests a more controllable and less emotionalย challenge.โ€

The report added that a New York Times analysis found the term โ€œglobal warmingโ€ appeared in a number of Bushโ€™s environmental speeches in 2001, but after receiving Luntzโ€™s memo, the White House shifted to consistently using โ€œclimate changeโ€ย instead.

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