Between Dire and Hopeful: Understanding Emotions in Climate Communications
1. Between dire and hopeful:
community
outreach, communications and
climate
Renee Lertzman, Ph.D.
Fellow, Portland Center for Public Humanities
Portland State University
lertzman@pdx.edu
4. psychology of climate change
communications
• Focuses primarily on cognition, information
processing and rational processes
• Emphasis on proximity, abstraction and
immediacy
• Using a “barriers” to engagement framework
• Focuses centrally on values and the so-called
“attitude-behavior gap”
5. Reframing: from barriers to
opportunities
• Emotions as central for how we respond to
climate change issues (Norgaard, 2011)
• Unconscious dimensions such as
anxiety, fear, hope and loss (Randall, 2009)
• Necessity for creative engagement and
participation (participatory processes)
6. Research study: The Great Lakes and
Green Bay
• Chose a field site ecologically
troubled, industrial
• Interviewed ten participants in “not engaged”
range
• Conducted interviews using psychosocial
methods
7. Research study: The Great Lakes and
Green Bay
• Chose a field site ecologically
troubled, industrial
• Interviewed ten participants in “not engaged”
range
• Conducted interviews using psychosocial
methods
10. Desires, dilemmas, hopes, fears
• In-depth interviews
• Accounting for contradiction, dilemmas
• Attention to emotions and affect
• Exploring relations between information and
actions
11. What I found
• Strong narratives of concern and care
• Ambivalence regarding action and
involvement
• Pride and honor of place (industry)
• Sadness and dismay, despair of degradation
• Self-opting out of action
(identity, ambivalence)
• Contradicting desires and fears
12. Howard, 69, Green Bay native
• Deep love of nature, water, environment
• Strong stewardship
• Father’s accident with the paper mill
• Attachment to “Paddle to the Sea”
14. The importance of emotional
(irrational) dimensions
Most social behavior from SUV ownership to
frequent flying, far from being a simple response
to inducements or threats, is mediated by
meanings, narratives, identities and feelings.
As communicators and engagement professionals
we need to build this into our work.
15. communications that allow for:
- Coexistence of conflicting desires and aspirations
- Addressing potential anxieties at the get-go
- Anticipating potential fears and loss
- Focusing on solutions and strategies in context of
the above
16. Rethinking ‘engagement’
• Investing resources for exploring
concern, fears, hopes, etc.
• Meeting people where they are
• Development of tools to encourage creative
investment
• Accommodation for difficult or reactive
responses (to climate-related initiatives)
• Focus on concern, rather that it’s absence
(‘apathy’ or ‘barriers’)
