Understanding Climate Change Denial

There are many puzzling things about our world that defy understanding.  For me one of these is that it is possible that 50% or more of people in the USA might elect as president a man who has been described as a convicted felon, a self-confessed sexual abuser, a pathological liar, and one who ticks the boxes that point to a narcissistic personality.

 I also wonder why so many people continue to deny that climate change is happening and is linked to human activity in the face of a growing body of evidence that suggest it is not only real but represents a significant danger to the planet and all its inhabitants.  A 2021 poll of U.S. adults by The Economist/YouGov found that nearly 10 percent didn't believe that global warming is occurring at all; nearly a quarter believed that the climate is changing but not due to human activity, and 14 percent were unsure.

This was quoted in an article in Psychology Today by Joe Pierre which I found most useful in trying to understand why denial persists. I draw heavily on his article which identifies the following factors

1. Naïve Realism - the belief that our personal experience is reality. The fact that people still experience very cold winters is seen as a reason to question global warming. One wit suggested that while global warming was a threat to the rest of the world, it is a promise in Ireland especially in the face of the cold wet summer experienced this year.  If, like in the Hutt Valley today (July 24) people wake to a temperature of 2 or 3 F which rises to 17 or 18 F by afternoon it is hard to believe that a 2 degree rise in global temperature is any cause for concern.
2. Disinformation: The author quotes a 2017 study which found that nearly 90 percent of Americans were still unaware of climate scientists’ consensus on anthropogenic climate change. This is in part due to a tactic described in a book called “The Merchants of Doubt” by Naomi Oreskes and Erik M Conway. When it is no longer advantageous to question the science, the idea is to do everything you can to plant seeds of doubt. This is often done by rolling out one or two scientists with controversial views that will make headlines in popular media. People often see these headlines but not the work of the other 97% of scientists which is mainly found in scientific journals. Pierre states that “like the tobacco industry dating back to the 1950s, there’s good evidence that Big Oil has known for years that anthropogenic climate change is a reality but refuses to acknowledge it publicly. That’s not denial. It’s deception”.
3. Motivated Reasoning: This a process whereby people try to deal with facts that conflict with their values or personal projects. One example is people who fly may say that the plane would have gone anyway. This allows them to keep a positive image of themselves despite behaviour that is harmful to the planet. This motivation can be personal and psychological which is about keeping out inconvenient truth that may call for a change in our belief and/or behaviour. It can also be political attempting in an institutionalised and organised way to deny truth to others.   Climate change denial is largely about what has been called “solution aversion”—an unwillingness to curb fossil fuel production because it will hurt one’s wallet.
4. Nihilism – Here Pierre suggests that individuals, organisations like the fossil fuel industry and Governments must act against immediate self-interests in favour of longer-term benefits that will prevent future disaster. This is a hard ask. The agricultural sector had been criticized for some of its practices, but I have noticed in interviews with Irish Farmers that those who have been able to act against immediate self-interest are coming up with innovative solutions that not only benefiting the earth but the farming community.

Pierre concluded by saying that “the biggest challenge in halting anthropogenic climate change isn't trying to convert those who continue to deny that it exists. It’s how to best translate growing acceptance of anthropogenic climate change into political and legislative action on a global scale”.

I am also wondering if these factors are also at play in American politics.

The article referenced here is: Why Don't People Believe in Climate Change?  By Joe Pierre. Posted April 2, 2022, on the Psychology Today website.

Fr Pat O'Shea, lives and works in Aotearoa/New Zealand