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Various scholars underscore the importance of public engagement with climate change to successfully respond to the challenges of global warming. However, although online media provide various new opportunities to actively engage in climate discourse through sharing, evaluating or publishing climate-related content online, so far very little is known about the drivers of public participation in climate discourse online. Against this background this study tested a theoretical model on the effects of media and interpersonal communication on participation in climate discourse online using data from a representative online survey of German citizens (n=1,392) carried out while the climate summit in Paris 2015. Over all, the results show that receiving information on climate change from social media (social networks, Twitter, blogs), active information seeking online, and interpersonal conversations about COP21 strongly encourage participation in climate discourse online. Moreover, results provide relevant insights on the role of interest in climate politics, personal issue relevance and climate scepticism as preconditions of communication effects.
Dorothee Arlt, U of Bern
Imke Hoppe, U of Hamburg - Institute of Journalism & Mass Communication
Fenja De Silva-Schmidt, U of Hamburg - Institute of Journalism & Mass Communication
Michael Brüggemann, U of Hamburg