Two new studies by researchers at the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication could dramatically change the way politicians and activists on both sides of the table talk about climate change (or global warming). The first survey established that, while Americans are equally familiar with the terms global warming and climate change, 45 percent say they hear global warming used more frequently, while only 12 percent say they hear climate change more. The second survey builds on the results of the first by exploring how Americans use these terms. It discovered that they appear to have very different meanings. In general, global warming is associated with a greater sense of fear and a threat against the respondent, the respondent’s family and Americans in general.
Such clear-cut results could prompt activists to drop climate change in favor of global warming. Before we do a search and replace on all of our conversations, however, it is worth taking a closer look at the results.
While most people and some organizations, such as the New York Times, use climate change and global warming to refer to the same effect, scientists make a clear distinction and generally prefer to use climate change because it recognizes that rising levels of greenhouse gases may have varying effects over the Earth’s surface, raising temperatures in many areas but also bringing more severe storms or droughts.
The concept of climate change generally includes global warming, so it certainly should not be true that global warming scares people more than climate change. Anyone who thinks global warming is happening and will have an adverse impact on human life by the dictionary definition must think the same is true of climate change.
That is where this new poll steps in with such interesting results. The poll was conducted by asking the same questions of two separate groups of about 1000 Americans each, randomly selected. The only difference was swapping climate change for global warming.
According to the results, Americans are more concerned about global warming on a whole host of questions. They are four percentage points points more likely to say they are very or somewhat worried about global warming, as opposed to climate change (52 percent versus 48 percent), and eight points more likely to think global warming will harm them personally a great deal or a moderate amount, again as opposed to climate change (38 percent versus 30 percent). A question asking about the possibility of harm to the respondent’s family drew a similar response: 42 percent saw a great deal or a moderate amount of harm from global warming, compared with 33 percent when asked the same question about climate change.
The overall numbers are compelling, but the breakdown of questions by demographic subgroup provides even more topic intriguing stories. The question “How much will global warming/climate change harm you personally?” saw higher percentages of various subgroups respond a great deal or a moderate amount for global warming. The difference was 12 percentage points for Democrats, 9 points for Independents and 4 points for Republicans. The global warming/climate change gap for women was 11 points and 15 points among Americans 68 and older. Among African Americans and Hispanics, the gaps were 22 points and an astounding 30 points respectively.
As the 2014 midterms approach and political parties begin their campaigning in earnest, these results provide valuable insights for politicians into how the most contested blocs of the electorate respond to changes in terminology. Activists might also consider changing their phrasing: Americans are 6 points more likely to say they would join a campaign to convince elected officials to take action to reduce global warming as opposed to climate change.
These results paint a very clear picture against the use of climate change, however scientifically correct it may be. However, it’s also worth examining questions that saw little to no distinction between the terms.
Equal percentages of respondents say climate change and global warming are happening, though they are slightly more likely to say global warming is affecting weather in the United States a lot. They are equally likely to know that most scientists believe global warming/climate change is happening. Finally, and crucially, whichever term is used does not influence what Americans believe to be its cause: 47 percent say global warming is caused by human activities and 37 by natural changes to the environment, compared with 45 percent and 37 percent for climate change.
These points of similarity or divergence tend to follow a trend: when asked about facts, Americans give similar responses for climate change or global warming, but somehow have a stronger emotional reaction to the term “global warming”. This trend has been noticed before. The Yale report tells the story of Republican pollster Frank Luntz , who advised President Bush to drop global warming in favor of climate change. He said, “climate change is less frightening than global warming … climate change sounds like you’re going from Pittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale”. The Bush administration must have agreed, since after Luntz’s advice, it began using climate change instead.
Since then, though, this advice has gotten twisted around. Nowadays, there is less of a clear-cut division in usage among politicians and activists across the spectrum. For example, Obama in his Georgetown speech last summer mentioned “climate change” 14 times and “global warming” not even once. This past month, Republican Marco Rubio used phrasing similar to “climate change” to say “I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it.”
Based on these new surveys, should politicians, especially activists on the left, change terms? In the end, climate change still wins out. It is a more accurate description of what is happening and, though Americans hear it less frequently, they understand key points about its cause just as well as the more-used global warming. Additionally, the use of climate change can bring awareness of the varying effects this phenomenon can have beyond simply raising the temperature. The benefits of communicating clearly outweighs any benefit from leaning on the fear induced by global warming as a crutch. Global warming may pack more of an emotional punch, but consistent use and public awareness campaigns can fix that in the long term. With time and repeated usage, climate change could result in the same emotional overtones of threats, and most importantly, the same call to action.