What ways of talking locally about climate change have you found to be most useful?

Here in Austin, local impacts that people talk about tend to be flooding events, droughts, and wild fires, and personal impacts from those. One great resource for finding personal stories are the profiles put together by the Yale Climate Connections project. For example, a particular peach orchard in Fredericksburg, near Austin, has been suffering poor yield because the winters aren't as cold as they used to be. Without the temperature dropping enough, the buds don't form properly, and as a result they have had some summers with zero yield, which was unheard of for this farmer's parents and grandparents. These personal stories really help make climate change a local issue.

Great conversation and the importance of having conversations with family and friends aligns with the recent findings from  Yale's Climate Connections project:

We are pleased to announce the publication of a new research article, “Discussing global warming leads to greater acceptance of climate science” in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
 
There is an urgent need to engage Americans in the issue of climate change. Social science research has focused on many of the factors that influence public engagement, but surprisingly little of this research has examined the role of one of the most trusted sources of information: friends and family. In our new article, we investigate the role of climate conversations with friends and family in changing people’s beliefs and concern about climate change.
 
We surveyed a nationally-representative sample of American adults twice (N = 1,263), approximately seven months apart, and found that people learn important facts about climate change through discussion with friends and family. Specifically, discussing climate change with friends and family led to enhanced understanding of the extent of scientific agreement about human-caused climate change. In turn, better understanding of the scientific agreement led to increased belief that climate change is happening and is human-caused and to increased worry about it. Interestingly, we also found evidence that the link between discussion and climate beliefs can operate in the opposite direction. That is, increased perceptions of scientific agreement led to increases in discussions about climate change – suggesting that climate conversations can initiate a positively reinforcing cycle between learning, worry, and further conversation.
 
These findings highlight the importance of climate conversations with friends and family, which can engage people more deeply in the issue of climate change.

The open access article is available from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. If you are not able to access the article, please send an email to climatechange@yale.edu, with the subject line: Request GW Discussion Paper.
 
This project was supported by the 11th Hour Project, the Energy Foundation, the Grantham Foundation, and the V. K. Rasmussen Foundation.
 
As always, thanks for your interest and support!
 
Tony, on behalf of the research team,
 
Matthew Goldberg of Yale University, Sander van der Linden of the University of Cambridge, and Edward Maibach of the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication.

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Anthony Leiserowitz, Ph.D.
Director, Yale Program on Climate Change Communication
School of Forestry & Environmental Studies
Yale University
(203) 432-4865
Twitter: @ecotone2
environment.yale.edu/climate
yaleclimateconnections.org

This timely helpful advice is from NYTimes' Climate Fwd: today 😀

One thing you can do: Be a climate communicator By Tik Root

So, you’re committed to reducing your carbon footprint and you’ve identified the individual actions that work for you. Great! But what next?

Try talking to others about climate change.

“Family and friends are our most trusted source of information,” said Connie Roser-Renouf, an associate professor at George Mason University who specializes in science communication. “Talking about what you do and giving people a sense that they can do to make a difference is extremely important.”

One example, Dr. Roser-Renouf said, is the strong link between parents and children in terms of attitudes toward climate change. A recent study found that children talking to their parents about the issue can have a big influence. “The parents get more engaged,” she said, “and everyone does more.”

Another study found that people were better at conserving electricity when the power company informed them of their neighbors’ energy usage. Research published in June concluded that “perceived social consensus is associated with a higher percentage of people who believe climate change is real and human-caused.”

Yale Climate Connections has guides on how to talk about climate at social gatherings, and to children. The Times also has advice on discussing climate change with young people. Dr. Roser-Renouf says the first step in talking to others is to find out how they feel about the issue, then you talk about why you care about the issue.

Connecting climate change to your local community often provides a good point of reference, she said. Asking someone to become part of a group that you participate in can also be effective, she noted, pointing out that such a request is among the top reasons that people join an organization.

Regardless, Dr. Roser-Renouf says that being a climate communicator is a critical contribution. “Interpersonal communication is much more powerful than mass media information,” she said. “It’s the people we talk to and care about that persuade us.”