Public perception of climate change shaped by regional impact and media coverage

Different views on global warming—what causes it, and what to do about it (if anything)—dominate the public discourse. There seems to be little, if any, room for debate on the phenomenon of climate change itself. However, there is a debate on the perceived severity of the issue, public perceptions, and especially views on how to change public policy in order to mitigate or respond to climate change. In “Global Warming of ‘Grave Concern’ in Alaska,” (2017), the news reporters show how subarctic regions stand to lose the most from climate change. Therefore, this article also suggests how climate change is perceived differently depend on where in the world a person lives. Societies that are more immediately affected by climate change in their daily lives, such as towns in Alaska or low-lying coastal regions of the world susceptible to flooding, may perceive climate change differently than areas that are less affected. The Al Jazeera article uses specific examples from the scientific data, showing that November 2017 was one of the warmest months on record, and in the Arctic, “warming is happening twice as quickly as anywhere else on the planet,” (p. 1). Permafrost has melted in some areas, creating swamps. Moreover, the authors of this article show that too much news coverage can worsen the problem because it leads to apathy from “climate fatigue,” (p. 1). Similarly, in “Why climate change isn’t our biggest environmental problem, and why technology won’t save us,” Heinberg (2017) critiques popular media coverage of climate change issues. However, Heinberg (2017) also claims that news articles that focus only on climate change are missing the point about the bigger picture issues. According to Heinberg (2017), a systems approach is required in order to understand and resolve climate change concerns. Overpopulation, too much resource extraction, food insecurity, and pollution are also issues that are connected to the same root causes. Advocating a systems approach, Heinberg (2017) does not necessarily claim global warming is not a concern but that it is only one of many other concerns human beings face. Both the Heinberg (2017) and Al Jazeera news article highlight some of the social psychology concepts that illustrate differences in opinion, attitude, and perception. For example, both articles tacitly refer to attribution theory: human beings explain phenomena like global warming differently depending on their cognitive frameworks. Attribution errors are linked to cognitive biases, such as attributing global warming to something other than human activity. Neither article directly mentions group polarization, but group polarization is what happens when political partisanship creates cognitive biases in attitudes towards global warming. As both articles offer critiques on media coverage of global warming, they also demonstrate social learning theory. Because the climate change debate can be socially constructed, it is important to understand how the media shapes public perceptions, and how groupthink may come into play when it comes to determining public policy or consumer behavior. Both articles offer sound arguments. The news article in Al Jazeera is compelling because it focuses on a few specific example rather than making the sweeping global generalizations that Heinberg (2017) does. The Al Jazeera article also shows explicitly how attitudes towards global warming will change when people see the impact of climate change first hand in their daily lives. On the other hand, the Heinberg (2017) argument is more thorough and nuanced. The author avoids typical clichés and stereotypes about global warming discourse. Instead, Heinberg (2017) advocates a systemic approach to the subject that has the potential to reduce cognitive biases. Heinberg (2017) urges the audience to think about a range of issues besides climate change, such as overpopulation and food insecurity, and to also adopt a more realistic approach to mitigating natural disasters. Because Heinberg (2017) actively seeks to reduce cognitive biases that lead to groupthink and stereotyping, it emerges as the stronger of the two articles.