PBS.Org published a thought-piece on January 4, 2019 concerning how our brains stop us from taking climate change seriously. Their report includes input from environmental psychologist Robert Gifford at University of Victoria in British Columbia. He believes changing attitudes about global warming begins with “understanding a person’s demographics”
Changing Attitudes: The Small Things We Could Do
The average American emits about 17 tons of carbon every year. They don’t know “the average house has air leakage equivalent to a small window being open all year round,” according to Richard Heede.
The co-founder and co-director of Climate Accountability Institute explains further. “If people can caulk these leaky areas, this would help reduce cold infiltration and lower heating bills.” Many people are not changing attitudes and heeding this advice because climate change is not real to them in terms of their values. Every expert PBS.Org spoke to said, “The best weapon against this is you”.
People Shape Their Behavior Around What They Favor
“If you favor patriotism, you’ll attend parades. If you favor the outdoors, you’ll go camping or hunting,” Robert Gifford says. “The goal is trying to get people to have a greener identity, an intrinsic motivation instead of an extrinsic motivation.”
We should therefore explain how warming is going to affect climate change-naysayers personally. Unless of course they are polar-bear-huggers, or obsessed about permafrost. They are far more likely to respond if they know their beloved national parks are under threat, or it will become too hot to march in parades.
Finally, Robert Gifford believes telling people their green sacrifices will make them heroes works best of all. Perhaps that’s because most us yearn to be popular and admired by everyone. We hope this extends to changing attitudes about warming too.
Related
Our Brains Block Us on Climate Change
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Preview Image: Terracing Reported to Increase the Water Table
