Transcript Bild 1 - Uppsala University

PEOPLE BEHAVE
IRRATIONALLY TOWARDS
CLIMATE CHANGE –
What to do?
Marta Cullberg Weston
The knowledge deficit hypothesis
is not the issue in the West
Most people know a fair amount but we still do
not act on our information.
But there may very well be important aspects
people do not know (e.g.tipping points)
It is rather a question of how information
needs to be framed to reach people
and how to make them act.
Goal?
 Raise awareness
 Attitude change
 Behavior change
Human fear system not adapted to
modern world threats
Our ”old brain” reacts to immediate threats
Wild animal =Action now --adrenalin flows
Threat responses: 3 F
 FIGHT
 FLIGHT
 FREEZE
 Denial
The threat from climate change is hard
for humans to handle
 Diffuse /invisble /in the future/ distant
 No one clear action that solves the problem
Threat to ozone layer
 Quick response from law makers
 Simple identifyable targets
Success story
”Global warming” muddied the
water
 Climate change more correct
 Sustainable development –diffuse term for
many…
Human beings are not rational
 Scaring people will not work well
 Fear (when we see no way to fight it) may
lead to apathy= a feeling that nothing can be
done
The human dilemma
1. OSTRICH PATTERNS (denial
mechanisms)
2. COGNITIVE TRAPS that block good
decisions
3. SOCIAL TRAPS that lead to unwise
decisions
4. ECONOMIC TRAPS that make us blindfolded
A threat without a clear solution gives rise to
unnerving feelings we want to avoid
 Fear/anxiety
 Powerlessness/helplessness/apathy
 Guilt…(that we are responible)
Humans have an array of different denial
mechanisms to avoid those unpleasant
feelings and the information that cause them
1. The Denial Mechanisms
Different ways to shut our eyes
(If you put your head in the sand you know something is wrong)
Many versions of denial
 Breakfast defence –cognitive scan --emotional denial
--give peace for the moment but bad in the long run
 Diffusion of responsibility/denial of guilt
(blaming others)
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Denial of the content of the threat
Impossible to affect/will take care of itself
Technical solutions will handle it
It just won’t happen!
You can recognize
 Stanley Cohen: literal denial/interpretive denial
(spin) /implicatory denial
 Opotov & Weiss: denial of outcome and severity;
denial of self-involvement
 Morris Rosenberg: Selective perspectives (to keep
unpleasant feelings at bay)
Denial helps us distance ourselves from the
threatening reality --when we think we cannot do
anything about it)
John Krosnic:
”People stopped paying attention to global
climate change when they realized that
there is no easy solution for it.”
We hate to feel powerless/vulnerable
(we did as small children— we do not want it again)
Leads to what Robert J.Lifton calls
The absurdity of the double life
”The Nazi Doctors”
We live with a disconnect between
abstract information and everyday life
in order to go on with daily life
Information needs to be combined
with solutions !
 Target specific groups
 Provide solutions
 Target emotions to bypass denial
mechanisms
Emotional communication
important
Emotions direct our actions.
A lot of emotional information is stored
without words in the right brain --right brain
communicates in images not in words.
That is why I suggest using images to reach
people –as you may have noticed.
Successful Vietnam war image
Todays world --Information overload
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Good at screening messages
Need to reach people´s emotions
Inventive storytelling
Use new media (the Arabian spring/Obama)
Target specific groups…
Psychological denial is increased by social
denial mechanisms (examples in Norgaard)
To raise the issue of climate change in certain social
situations is like swearing in the church.
”We cannot dig ourselves into a hole”
The ascetic dogma can scare many people off…
(taking the car away from people= ”no way”)
PEER SUPPORT
 To get around the social pressure—
important to have a peer group where you
support each other and find ways to work
with climate change in ways that feels worth
while (alleviates powerlessness)
1B. Not only denial because of
anxiety -- but resistance to
relinquish ingrewn habits
Holding on to our habits
 Denial of guilt/responsibility
(blame is not effective)
 Want to keep our good self-image
 Pushing blame to others (between states)
 ”My contribution is negligable!”, ”My
neighbor drives his car…”
 Denies reality of limited resources
Breaking old habits takes special
compliance mechanisms
 Regulation
 Economic cost (car tolls)
Incentives:
 TV-serie—which family can live most
environmentally friendly
 Cleanest town competition
Mark Lynas:
The whole of Western society is
based on denial mechanisms -i.e. denial of the world´s limited
resources
How to reduce denial mechanisms
The solution is not more information per se---but
how information is given.
Too threatening information can lead to total
denial (The film Undergången)
The information must point out realistic solutions
We must overcome habit hurdles by forcing
change of actions through regulation and a
price tag or incentives.
Information needs to point out ways to solve the
problems = anxiety control
The suggested measures need to be seen as
effective= control of danger
Information needs to be supplemented by
regulation
Information needs to be supplemented by
societal measures
 If you tell people they have a role to play in
saving the planet there must be an
infrastructure to make that contribution -e.g. recycling facilities
 Address specific issues so you do not
overwhelm your audience…
 Storytelling a way to reach people…
Denial reducing mechanisms
 Reduce anxiety by giving suggestions for
effective solutions Robert Socolow and Stephen Pacala’s
pieces of the cake
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Use images to get to emotions
Stop talking—take action (acceptance of the fact)
Higher price tag on bad habits/ Incentives
Good role models (politicians important)
Discussion of life styles— gains with new style
Responsibility for future generations-- their
inheritance
Positive change ex: Smoking
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Politicians took action assertively (at last)
Massive information campaigns
Information in schools/young people
Problem with climate change..do not want to
scare the young into hopelessness/ denial
 Do not want to pass on our burden to them
II. COGNITIVE TRAPS =
IRRATIONAL DECISIONMAKING
Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky et al
(many different researchers)
Cognitive traps/cognitive bias /mental errors
Five major types of cognitive traps
CT 1. Fixation at the present = status
quo bias
a) What has never happened before cannot
happen! (Jews in the ghetto)
b) Problems with long term decisions/ distant
consequences have a hard time to sink in
(smoking)
c) Problems with gradual changes (the frog)
d) System fixation (ex. liberal capitalism)
How to inform to avoid this? Images and more.
CT2. Bias when making uncertain decisions
a) Tendency to underestimate situations with
low probablility (risk analysis faulty)
b) Tendency to forget risks that you lack
sufficient information about / diffuse risks
( 2 degree temperature change diffuse – Mark Lynas 6
degrees. Tipping points — irreversible processes)
c) Denial of effects that happen far off
geographically or far off in time
Important with concrete information/images/ +
linking to local situation (Vasa ski race)
CT3. Cognitive traps in estimating
probablility
You make the estimate of the future
probability of a situation based on how well
you can perceive it.
Changes in climate are hard to show in
easily grasped facts
Important with images + show what is happening
where people live (local information)
CT4.Illusion of having control
a)Overestimating technical solutions
b) Sense that humans are in control
Inform how we now can influence the process
=find solutions
Technical solutions take time to develop
CT5.Anchoring decisions in
what is ”known”
a) Nature seen as an unlimited resource
b) Interpreting the information so it confirms
people’s own ideas.
Information with number of globes needed to
fill the demands + breaking up set ideas.
How to counteract cognitive biases
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Images of glaciers / polar bears
Mark Lynas’ 6 degrees — concretizing
Environmental footprint /number of worlds
Reports of consequences for own country/
community + plans to counteract the problems
 Action programs for many different sectors(Socolovs och Pacalas pieces of cake)
 Tying the world together –”the there” affects ”the
here” (environmental refugees, food)
 Be careful with scientific ”probablilities”–excuses
 Show alternative models of building societies
 Show how small change in economic model can
change things around and more….
III. SOCIAL TRAPS
A situation where a group of people act to
reach a short term goal that leads to a long
term loss for the group.
A good description of what we are doing right
now—we are in a real social trap acting to
preserve our present energy consuming lifestyle
III. SOCIAL TRAPS
Examples:
 The tunnelvision of the ant
 The tragedy of the commons
 The fate of Easter Island
ST1. THE TUNNELVISION OF THE ANT
Building on our own little home
oblivious of what goes on around us.
TV programs about home makeover
Eviatar Zerubavel: social organization of denial
How to get through?
ACTIONS
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LOOK UP— SCARE JUST ENOUGH
RESONSIBILITY FOR GRANDCHILDREN
OPPORTUNITY FOR BETTER LIFESTYLE
Incentives: TV-series: Living
environmentally friendly- making it a
competition
New suggestions?
ST2.TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS
 Garret Hardin (1968)
 William Forster Lloyd (1833)
GARRET HARDIN:
”Ruin is the destination toward which all
men rush, each pursuing his own best
interest in a society that believes in the
freedom of the commons. ”
The tragedy of the unregulated commons
Elinor Ohstrom: With regulation this kind of
trap can be avoided – people can stipulate
ways to share ”a commons”
At the globe level however another issue
--no sufficient regulatory body
ST3. Fate of the Easter island
Similar to the tragedy of the commons =
Depletion of limited resources leads to catastrophy
 WE HAVE NOT REALIZED THAT OUR
PLANET IS A LIMED RESOURCE BASE
Economic system has seen nature’s
resources as goods to be exploited
Need a new perspective= if we want part of
our common heritage we have to pay for it –
and take care to restore
4. Economic trap
Maximization of gain without
taking environmental costs into account
=Faulty equation
New thinking within economics needed
Peter Barnes: (Capitalism 3.0)
Tragedy of the market
We are locked into an economic theory
where each business is supposed to
maximize its profit – independent of the cost
for the environment.
Stern report:
 ”Global warming is the most extensive
failure for the market”
 Climate change is ”bad for business”
 Forceful preventive actions early on can be
seen as a profitable investment
Needed: Change in economic thinking from
within economic field
Tragedy of governments
Locked into a ”growth model”
Prioritizes the interest of businesses
Another model for growth--Peter Victor (see
on Youtube talking about ”the folly of growth”)
 We overshot the capacity of the biosphere
already around 1980
 People can adapt—harder to change
institutions
Actions in relation to economics
 Regulation, carbon tax, fee for C02pollution
 International agreements (post Durban)
 Change in economic thinking– environmental
costs included
 Another view on growth= sustainable
development
”Capitalism that started as a brilliant solution
has become a major problem.
It is time to upgrade the operating system!”
Peter Barnes
New economic thinking is on the way
Wish:Nobel prize for sustainable economics
How can we make people wake up?
How do we inform about limited resources?
How to increase awareness?
•Need a steady flow of information
•The information using images needs to
address different angles, present solutions and
help to overcome habits
There is a ”critical point” where enough people
have accepted the fact
PARADIGM SHIFT
THE HUNDREDTH APE
Paradigm shift
Lyall Watson
SYSTEM RESISTANCE MAKES
PARADIGM CHANGE SLOW AT FIRST
 Galileo’s fight to prove Earth is round
 Doctors washing hands between patients
Strong initialt resistance to new regime/fact
Over a critical level= Established fact
Potentials for change-from worry to action
I. PARADIGMSHIFT
II. GROUP INSTINCT—THE HUNDREDTH APE
III. NEW GLOBAL COMMUNICATION SYSTEM
Central actors and partners
 Media (information)
 Economists-- change in econ. thinking
Businesses
 Governments/politicians (political incentives)
 Engineers/researchers (technical inventions)
 Population (change in life style)
Media
 How they frame news about the
environment—and the space given to info
 Images and how well placed
 Show solutions and gains
 Sustain hope but also push towards change
ECONOMISTS
Problems:
 Market economy’s distaste for regulation
 Neoliberal economic theory: Profit
maximization of companies without
considering evironmental costs is not adapted
to reality
ECONOMIST ACTIONS
 Change in economic theory/thinking from
within the field
 Develop/explore alternative models for
ecological governance
 Change in view of regulation
Business Enterprises
 Need to realize that climate change is bad
for business
 Need to invest in clean technology
 Ethical programs for big businesses
 Political regulation and higher cost of energy
 Use the flexibility of the market (ex.
environmental cars)
Politicians
Problems:
 Afraid to take impopular actions
 Wish to be re-eleced favors short terms
decisions
 Live in a culture of promises
 Their own denial mechanisms
 Cost for society
 Hesitating to put regulations in place (due to
business interests)
Actions in relation to politicians
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Pressure from electorate
International agreements are urgent
National studies to support actions
Leadership/responsibility
Moratorium on geoengineering projects
Engineers/Researchers
 Putting too much hope in technical solutions
 Time perspective—preventive actions take
time to develop (e.g. sequestering CO2)
 Side effects of geoengineering projects that
may enthuse engineers
Actions in relation to engineers
 Money for research on environmentally
friendly energy sources
 Green technology development
 Ethical discussion of geoengineering
 Information of time-aspects to public
New challenge: Geoengineering
 Discussion/research on ”emergency
measures”
 Risk that it leads to passivity in scaling
down CO2 emissions
 Risk of one-sided experiments that go
wrong (unintended consequences)
 Risk of environmental wars
UU
WE THE PEOPLE
We need help to get out of
 Our bad habits
 Denial mode
 Cognitive traps
 Social traps
 Economic false models
We, the people
We need regulations, incentives and political
leadership in order to function more wisely
but we can actually open our eyes with
information that
 is solution oriented
 that gives us hope
 use images to reach our emotions
 is targeted and realistic
 shows effect locally
Post Copenhagen/Durban
depression
 As the international agreement road has not
produced results apathy has spread…
In the wake talks of geoenginneering is
popping up
The crisis mood
 Paradigm shifts takes time—it is under way
 Important not to give up even if it feels like
an uphill battle
 A crisis can make us wake up
 Unblanced systems are easier to change
Possibilities and insights
 Human fear system is not adapted to modern world
 We need to adapt our information to human biases
 Crisis can be an eye opener
 The group insticts of humans (The hundredth Ape) can
be used
 Paradigm shifts take time
Summary about information:
 Give information together with suggested
actions = no anxiety producing information
without ideas for a solution.
 Use imagery. Connect the here and the far
 Information needs to offset denial, cognitive
traps and hardened world views.
 Regulation & price tag on bad energy habits
 Working to offset social traps
 New economic thinking = e.g price tag on
carbon emissions and including costs for
nature in economic calculation
REASONS FOR HOPE
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Many journalists and politicians have woken up
More of general public are well informed
China and India — glacier melting will sound alarm
Regulation no longer a swear word (after
economic crisis)
Even some economists realize that climate
change is ”bad for business” – but more is needed
Paradigm shifts in several affected countries
Technical solutions for prevention are under way
but take time
New thinking around growth/commons based
governance etc
LOOK UP – it is a gift
OUR EARTH SEEN FROM SPACE