Abstract
Pseudoscience beliefs, whether on vaccines, evolution, or climate change, share common ground: Through firsthand experience, ideological doctrine, or even fraud, they deny systematic science methods and findings. The consequences of such beliefs can be dangerous. Whether these lead to epidemics of preventable disease, passivity based on a reliance on fate, the 2017 disastrous flooding in Peru, or the blizzards in the Midwestern United states, science denialism can spell catastrophe for humanity and the planet earth itself. As a major industrialized country, American adult perceptions of climate scientists as “controversially divided” on whether global warming exists, its extent, its causes, or possible solutions can be used to justify poor international cooperation, homeostasis, or even increases in fossil fuel consumption, and delays in necessary ameliorative actions.
These erroneous beliefs are why general public knowledge of climatologist consensus on humanly influenced or “anthropocentric” climate change matters, whether the figures are 97 or “99 percent plus” agreement. In a representative democracy, public beliefs factor into electoral outcomes, whether for school board members, national representatives, or even the presidency. These views can thus influence textbook adoption, legislation, or presidential cabinet choices on science and technology policy. To claim that scientists’ beliefs on global warming are contentious and divided provides apparent justification to citizens for political decisions that ultimately damage the planet.
As an illustration, I present factors related to 2006 and 2010 general public adult perceptions of environmental scientist consensus on global warming using the National Science Foundation Surveys of Public Understanding of Science and Technology (“the NSF Surveys” of S&T) collected by the General Social Survey (GSS; Smith, Marsden, & Hout, 2015). During a time when climatologists became virtually unanimous on anthropogenic global warming (e.g., Powell, 2015, 2017; Skuce et al., 2017), adult general public estimates of consensus among such scientists fell. Those seeing considerable scientific agreement dropped from 42% (2006) to 36% (2010), while those perceiving little or no agreement rose from 15% to 21% over that time. 1
Why would such a discrepancy between increased consensus among climate scientists but decreased general public perceptions of such agreement occur? Below, I compare relationships between perceived climatologist agreement and educational variables with more cultural and demographic factors, such as gender, ethnicity, religion, pseudoscience beliefs, or politics.
Considerable data document disproportionate male and Asian representation in physical science and engineering (e.g., National Science Board, 2016). One might expect those who reject pseudoscience (e.g., astrology) to have more sophisticated perceptions of the science establishment. After the Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District decision (e.g., Goodstein, 2005), some reports link presenting classroom alternatives to evolution to challenging research on climate change (e.g., Plutzer et al., 2016), thereby avoiding the separation of church and state issues raised in the Dover decision.
Most of these analytic variables were similar among the general public in 2006 and 2010; however, primary sources of science and information technology (S&T) information changed. 2 GSS respondents with home Internet rose from 64% to 74% over that time and estimates of adults referencing the Web for S&T information rose from 23% to 40% (χ2(1) = 53.5, p < .001). It has also been argued that “social identity politics” in recent years have rendered science beliefs more politicized (e.g., Hamilton, Hartter, & Saito, 2015; Iyengar, Sood, & Lelkes, 2012).
Method
Participants and Measures
The 1,403 total GSS adult respondents are from the 2006 (n = 928) and 2010 (n = 475) face-to-face interview NSF Surveys. These analyses reference the SCIAG (“AGREE”) item, which explicitly addressed perceived consensus on global warming among climatologists with a 5-point scale anchored by “nearly complete agreement” to “no agreement at all” (see the appendix for science questions used).
Predictors include study year, gender, ethnicity, degree level (less than high school through graduate school), the number of high school science courses (0 to 3), 3 and whether adults rated human evolution as true or false. Possible cultural correlates were whether the person considered themselves a born-again Christian, if they rated astrology as very or somewhat scientific (coded 0) or not scientific at all (“1”), whether they gleaned S&T information from the Internet compared with other media sources, and general political party (coded 0 for Strong Democrat to 6 for Strong Republican). Case losses on some items (e.g., 2.6% on party identification; 1.0% on perceived agreement) make the maximum possible total cases 1,385 combined for both years and 1,017 for multivariate analyses with list-wise deletion.
Results
Table 1 shows the drop in perceived climatologist consensus on global warming from 2006 to 2010. Drops occurred in both the “4” and “5” high categories. Table 2 presents multiple regression results of study year, gender, Asian ethnicity, being “born again,” degree level, high school science exposure, evolution belief, astrology rejection, accessing Internet S&T, and political party on perceived agreement. Even after entering potential mediators, 2010 respondents still perceived lower climatologist agreement than those in 2006. The better educated, Asian Americans and evolution supporters—as well as born-again Christians—attributed more consensus to climatologists. Republicans, respondents who rejected astrology and those obtaining S&T information off the Internet perceived less scientist agreement. Political party identification and degree level were the strongest predictors, although the overall explained variance was relatively low.
Perceived Environmental Scientist Agreement on Global Warming: 2006 and 2010 General Social Survey.
Note. N = 1,275. χ2(4) = 11.91, p < .05.
Factors related to high perceived agreement among Environmental Scientists: Regression Findings.
Study year, gender, ethnicity, born again Christian, evolution, astrology, and science news are dummy variables: 2010 = male = Asian = born again = astrology not scientific = science news via the Internet = 1. High scores indicate considerable perceived agreement. For degree level and political party identification, high scores indicate graduate school and “Strong Republican.”
R = 0.24 F10,1006 = 6.06*** n = 1017.
p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.
Discussion and Implications
Educational variables and some basic science discernment, such as rejecting astrology, had limited utility in predicting perceived climatologist agreement, with the exception of degree level. Initially, one might expect that astrology rejecters would also be more knowledgeable about scientific consensus, yet the reverse occurred. Perhaps these adults are generally more skeptical. Conversely, “born-again” adults may be generally more optimistic or trusting, including scientific agreement on global warming. These variables deserve further scrutiny, for example, with some of the GSS variables on trust.
One reason why general public adult perceived climatologist consensus dropped over a relatively short period of time may lie in the mixed climate change messages Americans receive. Classroom teachers (Plutzer et al., 2016) and television weathercasters (Wilson, 2009) often considerably underestimate the near unanimity among environmental scientists on global warming. Unfortunately, the Web compounds the problem; some sites among the vast number where “news” is available obfuscate science with opinion (Del Vicario et al., 2016.) The rise in “social identity politics” also may polarize science comprehension and undermine trust in science (e.g., Hamilton et al., 2015; Leiserowitz, Maibach, Roser-Renouf, Smith, & Dawson, 2013) in ways that Hunter (1991) suggested for “culture wars.” When weather forecasters, pundits, and politicians declare climate change a hoax or analogous to endorsing a “flat [not to mention 5500 year old] earth” (Lewandowsky, Oberauer, & Gignac, 2013; Shuham, 2016; Wilson, 2009), rejecting science findings has portentous implications for national policy that researchers, politicians—and citizens ignore at their peril.
To underestimate climatology consensus and see global warming as “controversial” in the science community smugly suggests that life can continue as before. Although such complacency might have had fewer consequences in the past, the growth of global industrialization and wealth has created a hunger for the “good and comfortable” life, which unfortunately often is accompanied by greater use of fossil fuels and natural resource pollution. Specialized scientists assert these outcomes cannot be sustainable at current, let alone increased, levels. The data and research presented here remind us that the nature of public understanding of science can be multidimensional and complex, as are its possible policy contributions.
Footnotes
Appendix
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.