A report from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication released Thursday shows that Americans who think global warming is happening outnumber those who think it’s not happening by a ratio of six to one (72 percent vs. 12 percent). Nearly the same percentage (70 percent) think climate change is tied to environmental problems such as extreme heat and wildfire.
The report, Climate Change in the American Mind, is based on a nationally representative survey that was conducted from April 13 to May 2, 2022, and that describes Americans’ beliefs and attitudes about global warming.
In the executive summary, the report’s authors, researchers at Yale University and George Mason University, note that an earlier survey and report, published in September 2021, had found an all-time high in public understanding of several key indicators, including that climate change is happening, that it is affecting the weather, and that it is harming Americans. The current survey shows that public concern about climate change has declined somewhat, as has the belief that Americans are being harmed by climate change right now.
Jennifer Carmon, a postdoctoral associate at the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, said the surge in Americans’ concerns about climate change last fall probably had to do with the huge number of climate-related extreme weather events during the previous summer.
“Many of these events were unprecedented in intensity, like the heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, and there was significant media coverage that linked these events to climate change,” she wrote in an email. “So in September of last year, those events were still fresh in a lot of people’s minds, but over the winter they may have faded in people’s memories. Since we’re experiencing plenty of extreme events like heat and fires this summer, and these events are still being affected by climate change, it remains to be seen whether we’ll see higher numbers again in the fall.”
In the 2022 survey, in addition to the large proportion of respondents who said extreme heat and wildfire are tied to climate change, 64 percent said they are at least “somewhat worried” about global warming. Thirteen percent said they have considered moving to avoid the impacts of climate change.
Two-thirds said they “rarely” or “never” discuss global warming with family and friends. Yet a majority, 61 percent, disagreed with the statement that “it’s already too late to do anything about global warming.”