Poster #15 - Bolstering the Value of Learning About Climate Science

• In Event: 31.094 - MTCC Poster Session Six
  In Poster Session: 31.094-6 - Relation of Beliefs, Goals, Emotions, and Educational Interventions to Academic Outcomes

Abstract

Getting the general public interested in learning about climate change represents a vexing motivational challenge. Using expectancy-value theory, we designed a novel intervention that leveraged relevance-for-others (rather than personal relevance) as a foot-in-the-door to boost people’s valuing of climate science. Results from our nationally representative sample indicated that asking people if it was important for students to learn about climate science before asking whether it was important for them, personally, to learn about climate science bolstered their personal valuing of learning about climate science. Although this brief intervention did not produce behavioral changes, we discuss the potential benefits of increasing the public’s valuing of learning about climate change.

Authors

• Hunter Gehlbach, University of California - Santa Barbara

• John Protzko

• Carly Dolan Robinson, Harvard University

• Christine Calderon Vriesema, University of California - Santa Barbara