Emotions, not emotion for climate messaging
Want to drive some support for climate policy?
You might want to get your audience a little emotional.
At least, that’s what research from Teresa Myers and colleagues from George Mason University suggests.
The team studied people’s emotional responses to videos about climate change. The videos looked at different aspects of climate change - the scientific consensus on climate change, the causes, the impacts, and solutions. They were quite factual and not designed to elicit any emotional response (unlike that cute puppy video you watched earlier).
Focusing on five different emotions - guilt, anger, hope, fear, and sadness - the researchers wanted to see if people’s emotional response to the videos influenced their support for climate change policies, like charging carbon taxes to fossil fuel companies or providing funding for people to make improvements to their homes so they use less energy.
So, what did they find? Here are some of the highlights:
If someone felt angry, hopeful, fearful, or sad after watching the video, they were more likely to support climate policy.
Anger toward climate change deniers increased support the most, followed by hope, fear, and sadness.
Feelings of guilt didn’t result in climate policy support. That’s quite interesting because, as the researchers note, other studies have shown the opposite.
The solutions video tended to increase hope but suppressed feelings of anger, sadness, and fear, while the videos about scientific consensus, the causes, and the impact of climate change suppressed feelings of hope. Is this a bad thing? The researchers suggest that, ideally, messaging should seek to pique multiple different emotions.
Want to read the study for yourself? It’s open access
Aitken, C. K., McMahon, T. A., Wearing, A. J., and Finlayson, B. L. (1994). Residential water use: predicting and reducing consumption. J. Appl. Soc. Psychol. 24, 136–158..https://doi.org/10.3389/fclim.2023.1135450.
