ABSTRACT

Effectively communicating the issue of climate change and related threats can be challenging for climate scientists, practitioners, and scholars. Environmental messages are so prevalent in the everyday media landscape that audience members often-times do not give them adequate attention. One potential avenue to educate the public and explain the risks of climate change may be through Public Service Announcements (PSAs). A randomized experiment was conducted to test a model informed by Protection Motivation Theory. The model suggests that exposure to a climate change PSA (versus a no-message control) is positively associated with self-efficacy and response efficacy, which are in turn associated with pro-environmental behavioral intentions. Results indicate support for the proposed model among participants with low preexisting environmental beliefs, and a ceiling effect for those with high beliefs. Counter to expectations, a reinforcement effect was observed; the PSA had a negative effect on those with unfavorable preexisting beliefs. Implications for environmental communication theory and message design are discussed.

摘要

对于气候科学家、从业者和学者来说，有效地传达气候变化问题和相关威胁可能具有挑战性。环境信息在日常媒体环境中如此普遍，以至于观众成员经常没有给予他们足够的关注。教育公众和解释气候变化风险的一种潜在途径可能是通过公共服务公告 (PSA)。进行了一项随机实验以测试由保护动机理论提供的模型。该模型表明，暴露于气候变化 PSA（相对于无消息控制）与自我效能和反应效能呈正相关，而这反过来又与亲环境行为意图相关。结果表明，预先存在的环境信念较低的参与者支持所提出的模型，对于那些有高信念的人来说，天花板效应。出乎意料，一个观察到加固效果；PSA对那些先前存在不利信念的人产生了负面影响。讨论了环境传播理论和信息设计的意义。