Motivating climate action through cultural impact

Weight lifter David Katoatau has already lost his home in Kiribati to coastal erosion, and  faces the loss of his whole country to rising sea levels. Dancing at the 2016 Summer Olympics didn’t stop the tides, but it grabbed attention to his country's fate, and raised awareness of the damages climate change is already having around the globe.

Researchers from Singapore Management University led by Professor Angela Leung, and her collaborator Prof Kevin Tam from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology are studying whether awareness of how climate change affects human cultures motivates people to support policies and take action to mitigate its effects.

Are some groups of people more aware than others? And does awareness prompt people to engage in climate change activism?

Read the original research: http://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-022-03337-8

Transcript:

Hello and welcome to ResearchPod. Thank you for listening and joining us today.

In this episode we look at the work of a team of researchers from Singapore Management University, a research conducted by Professor Angela Leung and her collaborator Prof Kevin Tam from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. The team is studying the impact of climate change on human cultures. They want to know whether awareness of how climate change affects human cultures motivates people to support policies and take action to mitigate its effects.

The real-life impact of climate change on human cultures was brought home to Dr Leung at the 2016 Summer Olympics. Weight-lifter David Katoatau became a social media sensation for his post-event dance routine, despite not winning a medal. He later explained that he wanted to draw attention to the effect that climate change was having on his homeland – the Pacific nation of Kiribati. Katoatau has already lost his home to coastal erosion, but he will also lose his country – in time every one of Kiribati’s 21 islands will disappear as a result of rising sea levels.

Many other places around the world are already experiencing extreme geophysical events. As well as rising sea levels, recent hurricanes, cyclones, floods, and wildfires have had severe human, economic, social and environmental impacts, including the loss of lives, livelihoods and habitats.

But the devastation doesn’t end there. Because communities are rooted in places, the effects of climate change also risk destroying tangible cultural heritage such as historic sites and buildings, and intangible cultural heritage such as traditional practices and ways of life. At their most extreme, the effects threaten to destabilise society and prompt the mass migration of ‘climate refugees’ to safer parts of the globe. According to the United Nations, those most at risk are indigenous peoples who live in close relationship to the land.

Dr Leung’s research is one of the first studies to look at the impact of climate change on human cultures. It sets out to answer three questions. To what extent are people aware of the impacts of climate change on human cultures? Are some groups of people more aware than others? And does awareness prompt people to engage in climate change activism?

The research tests various hypotheses. These include that awareness of the effects of climate change on human cultures will encourage people to take action to prevent it. In addition, those who take action will probably be more educated, and already act in an environmentally conscious way. They will also be more likely to have what Dr Leung calls a ‘cosmopolitan orientation’ and be open to, and value other cultures. Last but not least, politically they will be liberal rather than conservative.

Two studies were conducted for the research. The first involved 198, mostly female students from Singapore aged between 18 and 31. The second took place in the United States and with a bigger sample, involving 571 participants who represented the general population in age, gender and ethnicity.

The Singaporean research was a psychometric study in which participants had to agree or disagree with a series of statements, according to a scale which ranged from ‘strongly agree’ to strongly disagree’. The statements considered the extent to which participants believe that climate change threatens different aspects of human cultures and whether mitigating its effects can help to preserve them. For example, one statement read, ‘Climate change threatens the survival of indigenous cultures.’ Another read, ‘To protect traditional cultures we need to do more to reduce the impacts of climate change.’

Respondents also completed measurement scales to test, for example, whether they had a cosmopolitan world view, and identified with the rest of humanity. Other scales measured their personal actions to reduce climate change effects. These varied from private actions such as installing energy-saving products in the home, to public actions such as donating money to environmental causes.

In addition, participants were asked about their degree of support for governments to measure national development by more than economic output, for example by also considering environmental impact and life-satisfaction. Last but not least, they were asked about the benefits of actions to reduce climate effects, for example, the degree to which they would enhance society and preserve human cultures, or lead to societal dysfunction.

Overall, the results confirm researchers’ expectations. Respondents who were more cosmopolitan in outlook identified more strongly with all humanity, were less ethnocentric, and had greater awareness of the cultural impacts of climate change. They regarded taking action to reduce the effects of climate change as important for societal development, as well as for cultural preservation, both nationally and globally. They also thought that taking action to lessen its effects would help to create a better world that preserved human cultures.

As for personal and public actions, respondents who were aware of the cultural impacts of climate change were more likely to do what they could to reduce their own environmental impact. In addition, they were more likely to want environmental impact to be monitored and used as an indicator to inform national life. To a lesser extent they also supported national indicators for life expectancy and life satisfaction.

The study conducted on the American sample was similar to the  study on the Singaporean sample, but allowed for more rigorous testing across a wider range of measures in a different cultural setting. It added an open-ended question so that participants could describe the climate impacts and human cultures they were thinking about when they responded. It also gathered demographic data on people’s education level, household income, and political orientation.

The American participants were asked about their support for climate activism in greater detail. For example, whether they would publicly display a T-shirt or bumper sticker with a climate message, or attend a public meeting. In addition they were asked about their views on climate policies and the fossil fuel industry. For example, whether they thought fossil fuel companies should pay a carbon tax, and be allowed to continue prospecting for new mines, oil or gas fields.

The study also drilled deeper into participants’ opinions about climate change, including its causes, and whether climate change influenced their voting decisions. Other issues included whether respondents supported former President Trump’s withdrawal of America from the Paris Agreement – the international treaty agreed at the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference.

As in the Singapore study, the results of this study on the American participants confirm Dr Leung’s expectations that the perceived cultural impacts of climate change are a strong predictor of participants’ climate action and climate policy support.

Most participants were aware of the cultural impacts of climate change. Those with a higher level of education were more aware, and women were more aware than men. Awareness was not significantly associated with ethnicity, age or household income, but it was associated with political orientation – Democrat voters had a much greater awareness of the impacts of climate change than Republican voters.

Respondents who were aware of the cultural impacts of climate change were more likely to try to reduce their impact on the environment and engage in private activism. They were also more likely to support climate policies, including US participation in the Paris Agreement, and less likely to support the fossil fuel industry.

Answers to the open-ended question about the kinds of impacts on  cultures showed that respondents were aware of a wide range of impacts across the world. They spoke about examples such as droughts and loss of habitats, as well as the people being affected, from nomadic communities to indigenous peoples. They were also aware of the ways in which human cultures are affected, from cultural extinction, to disruption of the subsistence farming on which many depend.

While other studies have looked at public understanding of climate change effects, Dr Leung’s research is the first to focus on awareness of those effects on human cultures.

The Singaporean and American studies both reveal a high degree of public awareness. Those most likely to be aware are people with a more cosmopolitan outlook and global perspective, a concern for all humanity, and left-leaning political orientation. These people are also more likely to support climate policies, oppose the fossil fuel industry, and take appropriate personal and public action, including voting according to their environmental beliefs.

Dr Leung argues that the research provides the ground work for similar studies in other populations around the world. She also believes that its findings should influence climate change communications. As David Katoatau discovered at the 2016 Olympics, framing climate change messages in human cultural terms is a good way to attract public attention and has the potential to increase public engagement in climate action.

That’s all for this episode – thanks for listening, and stay subscribed to ResearchPod for more of the latest science and ideas. See you again soon.

Also published on: https://researchpod.org/earth-environment/motivating-climate-action-cultural-impact

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