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Sound bites are a big problem. If you want to talk to a vast audience, you need clear, direct and short sentences to communicate to the public your opinion, your thoughts and your knowledge. Thus, you should make an effort and talk in a way that is easily comprehended by the public at large, use something that would directly grasp people’s attention. It is a media rule: short is better and more effective. When you are hosted in a TV talk-show, when you are talking on the radio, writing an article or an op-ed for a newspaper – even when you are posting something in your blog – the option is always the same: be brief, the more words you are using, the more audience’s attention you are loosing. All you have to do is to find a sentence with “a minimum of word and a maximum of sense” (Mark Twain admirably outlined it in a sound bite).
But when you are dealing with science, short sentences and few words may build a message that could be (deliberately or not) inaccurate, elusive or even wrong at all. Science needs more than a blurb to explain what consequences a physical phenomenon is bringing to our everyday life. Climate is a good example of the confusion and misunderstanding sound bites can bring into the public debate. Even if the scientific community shares a vast consensus on some evidences, a vast part of the public opinion believe that there is a lot of disagreement among scientists about whether climate change is occurring or not and if it is caused by humans. According to the Global Warming’s Six Americas in May 2011 report by the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication only 39% of people in the United States believe that “most scientists think global warming is occurring”, and 40% believe that “there is a lot of disagreement among scientists about whether or not global warming is happening”.
It is quite clear that the public opinion perception on the climate change scientific consensus is far from the true. But climate change is gaining increasing attention by decision makers and involves policy resolutions at both local and international scale. This is a main topic involving the public opinion at large as much as it is discussed in the academia. Are scientists able to communicate their knowledge to a wider audience and to avoid misunderstandings and confusion about what science really knows on the changing climate?
We asked some questions to Lawrence Hamilton, Professor of Sociology and Senior Fellow of the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire, who investigated public knowledge and beliefs on environmental change. Dr. Hamilton told Climate Science&Policy that scientists should learn to communicate in different ways to different audiences while real-time Internet may be the key to disseminate correct knowledge on climate science in a communication environment ruled by sound bites.
CLISP – In the last decade topics such as climate change and global warming gained the public opinion’s interest and the attention of political institution both at national and global scale. Why did this topic reach such an increasing and unprecedented relevance in the public agenda?
Lawrence Hamilton – Climate change has become a major topic of research, as data from thousands of researchers contributes different parts of the puzzle. Many scientists were skeptical of anthropogenic climate change when this was a new hypothesis, but as the evidence built up over decades across so many fields, most shifted toward the modern consensus that climate is changing now due mainly to human activities, with potentially large consequences for the future. The public understanding of both the nature and content of scientific research can be unclear, but the salience of this topic is fueled also by current events such as new territorial claims in the Arctic, or the impacts of extreme weather events.
CLISP – Even if climate change is discussed in international meetings and conventions, researches and surveys tell us that people are confused on what climate change and its causes are about and what does the scientific community know, whether there is strong scientific consensus or not. Which factors are more effective in shaping the public perception of climate change?
LH - In the US, public opinion about climate change is heavily influenced by political factors. Scientific communication has not been perfect, and many scientists are working hard to improve it, but this is not the main problem. The traditional scientific approach of presenting research through refereed journal articles and scientific meetings now can be rapidly outpaced by political activists or writers on the Internet, for example, who are free to make any claims they want about the science. In a number of cases recently it seemed that bloggers and political think tanks held positions near the top of the information food chain, bypassing or re-interpreting science to make scientific-sounding arguments that went on to receptive journalists, politicians and the public.
Part of the communication problem is that the real science is not simple. “It’s cold here today!” is a sound bite that, on the right day, anyone can repeat. Explaining why today’s weather does not disprove global warming takes more words and sounds less exciting. Similarly, one can easily make a false but scientific-sounding declaration such as “Volcanoes release more CO2 than humans.” Explaining how scientists know that, in fact, human activities release far more CO2 than volcanoes do requires a lot more patience and understanding.
CLISP – Some people say that climate scientists should move beyond a dedicated audience and make an effort to communicate climate matters to the public opinion. In a recent editorial online, “Nature” magazine openly addresses scientists, affirming they should be even more energetic in delivering their message to citizens. How could a scientist talk about a tough topic such as climate change – which requires a multidisciplinary level of analysis involving science and politics, physics and economics – and avoid the risk of oversimplification?
LH - Real-time Internet and news media communication seems to be the key. All the traditional science communication channels are proving to be slow and too easily outmaneuvered by pseudo- and anti-science narratives in the modern information environment. Unfortunately, scientists need to more actively follow up on how their own work or field is getting reported, and publicly respond to misinterpretations. More need to participate in public discussions at every level. Fortunately, a small but growing number of scientists are doing this already, and are encouraging their colleagues to do likewise in publications and at meetings.
CLISP – Are you saying that climate scientists should learn to communicate and to become more familiar with new media and new opportunities to disseminate their results?
LH – Yes, scientists need to learn the new media, as some of them are doing very well already. This includes not only the Internet but videos, news outlets, public talks or whatever. Through something called the Science Café, two colleagues and I recently enjoyed an evening answering questions about climate change in a tavern! Different scientists will of course find they are good at different things, or that certain media suit their field.
CLISP – Won’t there be any consequences on research?
LH – Unfortunately yes, learning new kinds of communication is time not doing research. But the alternative, letting pseudo-science continue its rise in politics, seems worse.
CLISP – The public debate around climate change seems to be affected by a sort of polarization. On one hand you have people claiming that climate change is occurring and that it is primarily human-induced. On the other hand you have the so-called skeptics, people denying that climate change is occurring at all or assuming that, if the climate is changing, it’s only because of a natural course. Do you think this kind of polarization is affecting discussions among scientists as well, or does this oversimplification apply only to the non-specialized debate?
LH – Scientists are not polarized. This is obvious from scientific meetings, refereed journals, statements by every major science organization, national academies of science, international reviews and scientifically-designed surveys of scientists. A few scientists have argued against the consensus, suggesting that climate change is not happening, or if it is happening then it is not caused by humans, or if it is happening and caused by humans then the consequences won’t be bad, or even if they are they will be less bad than the cost of reducing fossil fuel use. These arguments do not agree on much except “don’t reduce fossil fuel use,” and their proposed alternative explanations (solar, cosmic rays, clouds cause warming, it’s a 60-year cycle, and so forth) have met with little success in terms of theory or data. Historically, a few scientists argued that we should not worry about the health effects of smoking or asbestos. There will always be contrarians but this does not mean science is “polarized”.
CLISP – There are some surveys showing that partisan and ideological views could influence what people in the US think about climate change. One of these surveys was lead by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press and showed a sort of ideological divide on climate change within the US electorate. Could this affect climate change communication?
LH – Survey research shows that many people do respect and listen to scientists. However, many others do not, when the scientific message seems to conflict with their ideological beliefs. Moreover, bloggers and political activists can provide scientific-sounding rationales for why it’s OK to reject science when you don’t like its conclusions. These are symptoms of deeper problems with US political life today—extreme partisan polarization of everything, along with the Internet and narrowcast media ability to form separate realities, in which everything you hear reinforces what you already believed.
* This interview was released on february 28th 2012
You may also be interested in :
- “Do you believe the climate is changing? Answers from new survey research”, L.C. Hamilton (2011). Carsey Institute, University of New Hampshire.
- “Climate change: Partisanship, understanding, and public opinion” (pdf), L.C. Hamilton (2011). Carsey Institute, University of New Hampshire.
- “Do scientists agree about climate change? Public perceptions from a New Hampshire survey” (pdf), L.C. Hamilton (2010). Carsey Institute, University of New Hampshire.
- Lawrence Hamilton official webpage at the University of New Hampshire