Climate change uncertainty among American farmers: an examination of multi-dimensional uncertainty and attitudes towards agricultural adaptation to climate change

Ajay S. Singh (), Francis Eanes () and Linda S. Prokopy ()
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Ajay S. Singh: CSU
Francis Eanes: Bates College
Linda S. Prokopy: Purdue University

Climatic Change, 2020, vol. 162, issue 3, No 5, 1047-1064

Abstract: Abstract A large survey of corn farmers in twelve US midwestern states (n = 6849) was used to determine the role of multiple dimensions of uncertainty on prior experience with climate change, attitudes towards climate adaptation, and use of climate outlooks in agricultural decision-making. Epistemic uncertainty refers to a perception about the level of information about a phenomenon. Aleatoric uncertainty is a perception that a phenomenon occurs at random and no new information will reduce uncertainty while response uncertainty refers to the perception of the efficacy of an action to reduce a risk. Epistemic and response uncertainty explained a large portion of variance of farmers’ attitudes towards adaptation and their willingness to use weather and climate outlook tools. Aleatoric uncertainty however did not add or added only a small portion of variance explaining farmers’ attitudes climate adaptation or use of climate tools. Our results indicate that climate scientists should not treat farmers’ uncertainty as a monolithic concept, but instead embrace its multidimensionality. We also suggest that reception of expert-led presentations or tools that have a lot of modeling data, which are often layered with statistical uncertainty, can negatively influence farmers’ model uncertainty.

Keywords: Climate change; Climate adaptation; Uncertainty; Climate communication; Agriculture; Food security (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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DOI: 10.1007/s10584-020-02860-w

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