Climate change is a topic that most of us would like to avoid, and for a good reason. Climate change is scary, depressing, and in some cases kind of dull. Even for someone like me who is genuinely interested in the topic, spending too much time thinking about it can be draining. The easiest thing to do is to ignore it and hope we don’t have to deal with it in the future. The fact is that we will have to deal with it at some point, and by the way things are going, I would say perhaps this will be sooner rather than later. Most of us have probably learned the hard way that procrastinating something simply because we don’t want to do it is not the best way of handling things. In fact, procrastinating will make the thing we are trying to avoid even worse.
Look, I am not saying all of this to scold you like my teachers did whenever I did not do my homework. Quite the opposite, actually. I am saying that talking about climate change suck, but that’s exactly what I didn’t understand: why can’t we talk about such an important topic?
After weeks of research in this topic, I’m beginning to understand that talking about climate change sucks because of the way it makes us of feel (Stoknes, 2015). I know this is not really a ground-breaking discovery, but here is what I found most interesting: The feeling we get from climate change are manufactured by the communication methods conveying that information (Armstrong, Krasny, & Schuldt, 2019; Stoknes, 2015). That means that the way we talkabout climate change affects the way we feel, and in turn, how we respond to it. For example, if a particular climate message makes us feel hopeful and motivated, then we are more inclined to talk about it. However, if a climate message makes us feel bad, then why would we ever choose to talk about it again?
The fact is that climate change is inherently an unenjoyable topic. I mean, we are dealing with the end of the world as we know it. That is not fun to think about. However, perhaps our aversion to climate change has more to do with the way we talk about it than the topic itself. Just look at the topic of war. The media loves a good war headline, and Hollywood produces movies about war almost every year; and we watch them! Despite being a sad and scary topic that most of us do not like thinking about, war has become entertaining, and we talk about it all the time. So, how come climate change is ‘too uncomfortable’ to talk about?
It all boils down to climate communications, which is a growing field of research that is just gaining popularity. Within the last few years, the field of climate communications has made significant advances that show how some ways of communicating climate change are very effective, while others are ineffective, making little to no difference on an audience (Howarth, Parsons, & Thew, 2020; Moser, 2016). Other forms of communicating climate change can even be detrimental, essentially having unintended negative effects, like increasing resistance to climate action (Ma, & Hmielowski, 2022). All of these depend on various factors that add yet another level of complexity to the topic of climate change. These factors can be things like the political party a person supports, they values they hold, the place they live in, or even the particular mood they are in when encountering information about climate change (Anghelcev, & Sar, 2014; Goldberg et al., 2021).
With so many variables at play, communicating climate change can be complicated. This is partly why it has taken this long to begin understanding the best way of doing so. However, regardless of the content of the message, the secret sauce for communicating climate change effectively appears to be doing so engagingly (Bennett, Hatch, & Pike, 2021; Howarth, Parsons, & Thew, 2020; Moser, 2016). That is, talking about climate change in an interesting, entertaining or pleasant way. Again, whether something is engaging depends on many factors, and the number of effective climate communication strategies is ever increasing (Moser, 2016). In fact, most climate communications to date have focused on the same unsuccessful strategy that is the information deficit model (Suldovsky, 2017).). This strategy assumes that simply educating people about an issue will automatically cause them to change their attitudes and behaviours to tackle the problem (Suldovsky, 2017). It is clear today that this strategy has not worked, as there continues to be climate denial and reluctancy to support climate action.
Perhaps the reason it sucks to talk about climate change is because we are not good at it. I mean, it is clear we are doing something wrong when talking about a problem makes us feel anxious and helpless rather than hopeful and empowered to solve it. I believe the only way to get better at something is by practicing, and only by talking about climate change can we find ways of doing so effectively.
I am not pretend to be some kind of expert here, because I’m not. I am just beginning to learn how to best talk about climate change myself, but based on what I’ve learned so far, here are a few questions I find useful to consider when talking about climate change:
- Does the message emphasize scientific and public consensus?
- Does the message tie to local experiences and provides tangible and relatable examples?
- Is the message communicated by a trusted source?
- Does the message inspire realistic hope?
- Does the message highlight current success and emphasize the need for further action?
- Does the message presents a simple picture in a way that is relatable and easy to follow?
- Does the message avoid scientific jargon, and uses simple and accessible language?
- Does the message highlight direct and tangible benefits?
- Does the message present actionable options for the audience to feel empowered?
- Is the message communicated at the right (political or cultural) time?
- Is the message communicated through a relatable and engaging narrative?
- Is the message tailored to the target audience and connects to their specific values, culture and motivations?
References
Anghelcev, G., & Sar, S. (2014). In the Mood for [the right kind of] Social Marketing Communication: How Congruity Between Consumer Mood and Message Framing Influences Intentions to Recycle. Journal of Social Marketing, 4(1), 38–57. https://doi.org/10.1108/JSOCM-04-2013-0025
Armstrong, A. K., Krasny, M. E., & Schuldt, J. P. (2019). Communicating Climate Change: A Guide for Educators. Cornell University Press. https://doi.org/10.7591/9781501730801
Bennett, A., Hatch, C., & Pike, C. (2021). Climate Messaging that Works. Climate Access. https://climateaccess.org/resource/climate-messaging-Canada
Goldberg, M. H., Gustafson, A., Rosenthal, S. A., & Leiserowitz, A. (2021). Shifting Republican Views on Climate Change Through Targeted Advertising. Nature Climate Change, 11(7), 573–577. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-021-01070-1
Howarth, C., Parsons, L., & Thew, H. (2020). Effectively Communicating Climate Science Beyond Academia: Harnessing the Heterogeneity of Climate Knowledge. One Earth, 2(4), 320–324. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2020.04.001
Ma, Y., & Hmielowski, J., D. (2022). Are You Threatening Me? Identity Threat, Resistance to Persuasion, and Boomerang Effects in Environmental Communication. Environmental Communication, 16:2, 225-242, https://doi.org/10.1080/17524032.2021.1994442
Moser, S. C. (2016). Reflections on Climate Change Communication Research and Practice in the Second Decade of the 21st Century: What More Is There to Say? WIREs Climate Change, 7(3), 345–369. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.403
Stoknes, P., E. (2015). What We Think About When We Try Not to Think About Global Warming: Toward a New Psychology of Climate Action. Chelsea Green Publishing. Suldovsky, B. (2017). The Information Deficit Model and Climate Change Communication. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Climate Science. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.013.301