Preparing to adapt: are public expectations in line with climate projections?

Carley M. Eschliman (), Emma Kuster, Joseph Ripberger and Adrienne M. Wootten
Additional contact information
Carley M. Eschliman: National Weather Center Research Experiences for Undergraduates Program
Emma Kuster: South Central Climate Adaptation Science Center
Joseph Ripberger: University of Oklahoma National Institute for Risk and Resilience
Adrienne M. Wootten: South Central Climate Adaptation Science Center

Climatic Change, 2020, vol. 163, issue 2, No 12, 871 pages

Abstract: Abstract In this study, we compare expressed public expectations of future climate with climate projections. Along with identifying general trends, we examine how demographic and ideological factors, as well as past weather experience, may affect these expectations individuals express. Through our analysis of a state-wide survey of Oklahomans in 2019, we find that Oklahomans, on average, expect a cooler, wetter future than most climate projections suggest. One’s future temperature expectations were significantly related to gender, age, political affiliation, and perceptions about recent temperatures. In particular, females, Democrats, Millennials, and those who thought the past 3 years were hotter than average were more likely to expect warmer futures. Meanwhile, precipitation expectations were significantly related to one’s recent drought and extreme rainfall experience, age, and race. Our results also suggest that expressed expectations of future temperatures are more likely to be influenced by ideological and demographic variables than expectations of future precipitation.

Keywords: Climate change; Climate projections; Public opinion; Climate communication; Climate adaptation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-020-02830-2 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:163:y:2020:i:2:d:10.1007_s10584-020-02830-2

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

DOI: 10.1007/s10584-020-02830-2

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 ().