Scientific analysis and predictions of climate change are only one source of information that individuals use to assess risk. For example, factors such as affect, imagery (associations), and values have been found to be stronger predictors of public climate change risk perceptions than knowledge of climate change causes, impacts or solutions, demonstrating that the experiential processing system plays an important role in risk perception and behavior. Yet we still know relatively little about how the actual experience of hazards influences subsequent risk perceptions and behavior in general, and nothing about how people respond to the experience of climate change, both as a gradual shift in average temperatures, and as expressed through particular extreme events.
This project investigates the role of experience in climate change detection, risk perception, and behavior in Florida and uses interdisciplinary methods, including ethnographic interviews, a media content analysis, and a representative statewide survey. Florida provides an excellent case study because the state has recently experienced a significant climate shift, has endured two record-setting hurricane seasons (which some scientists attribute, in part, to climate change, although this is controversial), and is particularly vulnerable to the impacts of future climate change.
