Communicating Climate Change: News Media, Efficacy Information, and the Revival of Hope

Dr. Lauren Feldman, Rutgers University

Media coverage of climate change often relies on dramatic narratives that emphasize disaster and tragedy, while omitting information about what can be done to address the problem. This has contributed to what some scholars call a ‘hope gap’, whereby even individuals who are concerned about climate change feel powerless to do anything about it. In this talk, I will discuss how the inclusion of efficacy information – or information about the likely effectiveness of actions to address climate change – in media coverage of climate change may help invigorate public engagement around the issue. I will present content analytic data that evaluates how leading television news networks and newspapers, in their reporting on climate change, have balanced information about the threat of climate change and the efficacy of actions to address it. I also will share results from a series of experimental studies that demonstrate how including either text or imagery that portrays climate change as an addressable problem can help inspire hope and, in turn, motivate climate activism and policy support – even, in some cases, among audiences who are ideologically predisposed to oppose climate action.  

Lauren Feldman (PhD, University of Pennsylvania) is an Assistant Professor in the School of Communication and Information at Rutgers University. Her research focuses on media effects in political and science contexts, and her recent work emphasizes three primary areas of interest: partisan media and polarization, political satire, and media and climate change. Her research has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the Carnegie-Knight Task Force on Journalism, and the Spanish Ministry of Science, and has been published in numerous peer-reviewed journals and edited volumes.