Cuing Racial Disparities of Climate Change Burden Reduces White People’s Pro-Environmental Intentions

Location

PANEL: Challenging Predictions, Patterns, and Excpectations of Human Social Behavior
Wilder Hall 112

Document Type

Presentation - Open Access

Start Date

5-13-2022 3:00 PM

End Date

5-13-2022 4:30 PM

Abstract

Climate change impacts people of color (POC) more than White people. What psychological impact does highlighting this disparity have on emotions and intentions to take action on climate change? We ran two studies to test this. In both studies, POC and White people completed a survey through Qualtrics (study one) or MTurk (study two) where they first read an article about how climate impacts disproportionately affect either POC (experimental) or coastal areas (control). They completed measures of threat, efficacy, and affective appraisals, as well as intention to perform climate mitigating behaviors in the next 6 months. POC were not impacted by the condition. Whites in the racial disparity condition were less fearful, which mediated a decrease in behavioral intention to mitigate climate change. White climate change deniers also felt less guilty, which mediated a decrease in behavioral intention. Consistent with Protection Motivation Theory (PMT), high threat and high efficacy appraisals yielded stronger behavioral intention. Condition did not affect threat or efficacy overall. The challenges of communicating about climate change racial disparities are discussed.

Keywords:

Climate communication, Race, Pro-environmental behavior

Notes

Presenters: Jewel Cameron, Devlin O'Keefe, and Wiley Smith

Award

Jerome Davis Research Award

Project Mentor(s)

Cindy Frantz, Psychology

2022

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May 13th, 3:00 PM May 13th, 4:30 PM

Cuing Racial Disparities of Climate Change Burden Reduces White People’s Pro-Environmental Intentions

PANEL: Challenging Predictions, Patterns, and Excpectations of Human Social Behavior
Wilder Hall 112

Climate change impacts people of color (POC) more than White people. What psychological impact does highlighting this disparity have on emotions and intentions to take action on climate change? We ran two studies to test this. In both studies, POC and White people completed a survey through Qualtrics (study one) or MTurk (study two) where they first read an article about how climate impacts disproportionately affect either POC (experimental) or coastal areas (control). They completed measures of threat, efficacy, and affective appraisals, as well as intention to perform climate mitigating behaviors in the next 6 months. POC were not impacted by the condition. Whites in the racial disparity condition were less fearful, which mediated a decrease in behavioral intention to mitigate climate change. White climate change deniers also felt less guilty, which mediated a decrease in behavioral intention. Consistent with Protection Motivation Theory (PMT), high threat and high efficacy appraisals yielded stronger behavioral intention. Condition did not affect threat or efficacy overall. The challenges of communicating about climate change racial disparities are discussed.