Public communication by climate scientists: what, with whom and why?

Marta Entradas (), Joana Marcelino, Martin W Bauer and Bruce Lewenstein
Additional contact information
Marta Entradas: London School of Economics and Political Science
Joana Marcelino: University Institute of Lisbon
Martin W Bauer: London School of Economics and Political Science
Bruce Lewenstein: Cornell University

Climatic Change, 2019, vol. 154, issue 1, No 5, 69-85

Abstract: Abstract Public communication of science has increasingly been recognised as a responsibility of scientists (Leshner, Science p. 977, 2003). Climate scientists are often reminded of their responsibility to participate in the public climate debate and to engage the public in meaningful conversations that contribute to policy-making (Fischhoff 2013). However, our understanding about climate scientists’ interactions with the public and the factors that drive or inhibit them is at best limited. In a new study, we show that it is the most published and not necessarily the most senior, which often talk in public, and it is primarily intrinsic motivation (as opposed to extrinsic reward), which drive them to engage in public communication. Political orientations, academic productivity and awareness of controversy, the topic raises in the public domain, were also important determinants of a climate’s scientist public activity. Future research should explore what is required to protect the intrinsic motivation of scientists.

Keywords: Science communication; Surveys of scientists; Public engagement; Climate change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-019-02414-9 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:climat:v:154:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1007_s10584-019-02414-9

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/10584

DOI: 10.1007/s10584-019-02414-9

Access Statistics for this article

Climatic Change is currently edited by M. Oppenheimer and G. Yohe

More articles in Climatic Change from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().