Comment: Why should we care about climate emotions?

Climate change – its impacts and who bears the brunt of them, the scale of the challenge, and in a different kind of way, policies to address it – can trigger a range of heightened emotional reactions. The UK public’s concern about climate change has been consistently high for a number of years, suggesting a type of ‘concern ceiling’ has been reached (albeit one with variation around events like extreme weather).

But concern, and even worry can be relatively passive feelings, and are always experienced in relation to a range of other priorities competing for limited attention spans. Other, and perhaps more profound or complex emotional reactions to climate change are important to understand too.

Worry, fear & hope

Worry and fear about climate change are connected to the belief that climate change is important, and so can play a role in focusing minds on the issue. Worry and fear in the face of climate change is perhaps inevitable, for people coming relatively recently to the subject as those who have thought about it a great deal. As many activists and commentators have pointed out, we should be worried about climate change.

The concept of ‘eco-anxiety‘ has entered the mainstream, and is particularly common among younger people. Global opinion research found that in 31 out of 32 countries, anxiety about climate change was linked to taking action on climate change, and even related to participation in climate activism (predominantly in richer countries).

But although it can motivate action, fear and anxiety about climate change can also be debilitating. The point is not that people shouldn’t feel anxious, but that eco-anxiety without an outlet, like any other form of anxiety, can simply become overwhelming.

The other end of the emotional spectrum – hope – has been found to increase action in some situations, and reduce it in others, by making people feel more complacent. There is tangible hope to be found in seeing others take meaningful action, or being heard and taking action ourselves. But there is also an insidious form of greenwashing lurking behind some appeals to be more optimistic: so-called ‘brightsiding’ is an erasure or downplaying of the very real risks that climate change brings.

Beyond hope vs fear

There is no simple dichotomy between worry and hope, and it can’t be assumed that a particular emotion will always lead to a certain outcome. Being more hopeful about climate change may make someone more likely to act, but those who are more hopeful may also have more opportunities and face less financial, political, and other barriers to action.

In an essay for the journal Nature Climate Change, Dan Chapman and colleagues write:

(T)he ‘go positive’ and ‘go negative’ simultaneously oversimplifies the rich base of research on emotion while overcomplicating the very real communications challenge advocates face by demanding that each message have the right ‘emotional recipe’ to maximize effectiveness. Rather than treat emotion as a lever or switch to be directly calibrated and pulled for a desired effect, the climate change communication community should adopt a more nuanced, evidence-based understanding of the multiple and sometimes counterintuitive ways that emotion, communication and issue engagement are intertwined. Emotions should be viewed as one element of a broader, authentic communication strategy rather than as a magic bullet designed to trigger one response or another.

Questions like “what does hope do?” treat emotions as objective and separate natural entities, when there is little scientific evidence to support this. In reality, people rarely feel just one emotion – and the range of emotions one can experience about climate change is wide.

Anger and action

Anger – in different forms – has been found to predict activism and support for climate policy. But a challenge for climate communicators is recognising that people respond to emotions in different ways –  for instance, when angry, some may respond by protesting, others not. And there are different kinds of anger: social psychological research distinguishes between ‘anger at others’ and ‘anger at self ‘. The environmental actions you support may be different if you feel angry at corporations or government, or if you feel angry at all of society, including yourself, for not acting on climate change.

‘Constructive’ anger is fertile ground for mobilising behind a moral cause like climate change. And resources like the Anger Monitor are asking how to harness the anger felt by citizens around the world, to pressure policy makers on climate change.

But ‘toxic’ anger – especially concentrated among those groups in society who are already disillusioned or disengaged – is difficult for climate activists to engage with, and is the type of anger that can be easily weaponised by extremists (perhaps against climate campaigners themselves).

Emotions in context

People’s emotional states are also rarely just about a single topic or issue. YouGov’s weekly ‘mood tracker‘ shows that at any moment, people in Britain are feeling happy, sad, frustrated, stressed, optimistic, and many more complex feelings, and these are likely to be related to all manner of things in their lives. Some emotions may be recurrent, others more transient.

Considering not just the emotions, but also the circumstances people face is central. For example, inequality is a barrier to action for many. Disengaged Battlers, a segment of the British public who are among the most concerned about climate change, are also the most likely to be unemployed or in unstable work. In focus groups, they express frustration about being asked to take actions that are inaccessible or impractical:

Emotions can help us understand what leads people to care about climate change, and also communicate climate change in a more compelling and relatable way. But understandably, attempts to evoke certain emotions can also cause reactance and backlash in people who feel they are being manipulated, or alienate those for whom the emotion doesn’t ring true. Focusing on authentic and honest communication strategies that meet audiences where they are, rather than attempting to manipulate emotional responses or socially engineer feelings, is the better strategy.