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Journal of Environmental and Social Sciences

Research Article


Head in the (Oil) Sand? Climate Change Scepticism in Canada

Gary J. Pickering*

Corresponding author: Gary J. Pickering, Professor, Biological Sciences and Psychology, Brock University, 500 Glenridge Ave, St. Catharines, ON L2S 3A1, Canada, Tel: +1 905 688 5550, Fax: 1 905 688 3104 E-mail: gpickering@brocku.ca


Citation: Pickering GJ. Head in the (Oil) Sand? Climate Change Scepticism in Canada. J Environ Soc Sci. 2015;2(2): 117.


Copyright © 2015 Pickering GJ. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.


Journal of Environmental and Social Sciences | Volume: 2, Issue: 2


Submission: 15/08/2015; Accepted: 26/08/2015; Published: 01/09/2015


Abstract


Determining the extent to which specific psychological barriers limit climate change mitigation behaviour, particularly in individuals from industrialised nations with poor mitigation performance, is a global concern. This pilot study sought to establish for the first time the extent of climate change scepticism in a representative sample of Anglophone Canadians and determine how it may vary with knowledge, values and socio-demographic factors. Participants (n=229) responded to a mail invitation to take part in the online survey. Scepticism and uncertainty toward climate change were assessed using a validated 12-item attitude index that yielded a composite scepticism score. Environmental values were assessed using a modified version of the New Environmental Paradigm scale (NEP), while political association, education attainment, climate change knowledge, and several demographic variables were determined using established measures. A full factor multiple regression analysis showed region, NEP score and Conservative Party of Canada association as the significant predictors of scepticism. When independent factor groupings were modelled separately, values and politics explained 31% of the variation in scepticism scores, socio-demographic variables 6%, and education and knowledge 3%, highlighting the dominant role of environmental values and political orientation. These results are discussed in the context of the theory of socially-organised denial of climate change and the information-deficit model of climate inaction. The findings provide baseline data that will allow changes in climate change scepticism to be tracked over time, and help to inform how public policy and messaging strategies might be optimized to facilitate climate mitigation behaviour.


Keywords: Climate change; Environmental psychology; Perceptions; Uncertainty; Public attitudes; Climate sceptics; Mitigation barriers

Introduction


The evidence for anthropogenic climate change is extremelycompelling; indeed, it reaches a level of scientific consensus that isalmost unprecedented [1]. While the need for urgent and sustained action to mitigate and adapt to this threat is widely acknowledged, our global response to climate mitigation thus far has been wholly inadequate. For instance, total emissions of green house gases (GHG)- the major anthropogenic contributor to climate change - continueto rise, despite the scientific evidence for and increasing publicawareness of their role in climate change [1,2].


While commitment to and the efficacy of mitigation policiesvary significantly between nations for various economic, politicaland ideological reasons, perhaps surprising has been Canada’s poor response over the last decade. Canada traditionally perceivesitself as an effective leader on global affairs and threats, includinginternational environmental issues [3], yet now finds itself at thebottom of the Climate Change Performance Index for both G8 andOECD member countries (30th from 30 in 2014). Indeed, “Canadastill shows no intention of moving forward with climate policyand therefore remains the worst performer of all industrialisedcountries” [4]. Domestic federal policy on GHG emissions hasremained relatively static across both Liberal and Conservative Partygovernance [3], while national [5] and global [1] emissions have risen.With current ‘business as usual’ climate mitigation efforts, globalGHG emissions are projected to grow over the next several decades,with increasingly negative impacts on human health and well-being[1]. Given the significant proportion of GHG emissions attributable to individual and domestic energy use in developed countries (e.g. 6),the severity of climate change impacts is dependent on the extent towhich individuals choose to engage in mitigation behaviour [6].


Psychological barriers to action


Various psychological barriers preventing such individual action have been identified [7-10]. The latter study, for instance, identifies approximately 20 specific impediments, categorising them within seven psychological constructs: limited cognition, ideologies, other people, investments, discredence, perceived risk and limited behaviour [11]. Common to the various schema in this literature is he concept of climate change scepticism, which while used to capture multiple constructs [12], is understood here as the belief that climate change is not occurring or that human activities are not a significant contributor. These beliefs manifest themselves along a continuum of varying degrees of uncertainty, through to absolute denial. In the context of resource dilemmas, perceived uncertainty reduces proenvironmental behaviour and likely promotes action that is more orientated toward self-interest [13]. As noted by APA [9], uncertainty probably functions as a justification for climate change inaction or postponed action. In addition to directly influencing inaction, uncertainty and scepticism may also impact mitigation intent or behaviour by mediating or interacting with other psychological barriers. For instance, uncertainty increases perceived powerlessness about environmental problems [14], which in turn affects proenvironmental intentions and actions including climate mitigationbehaviour [15,16].


Whitmarsh [17] examined climate change attitudes and beliefsin the UK, and noted that the increasing certainty of climatechange in both scientific and media messages was at odds with therelative stability of climate change scepticism amongst the public, inapproximate agreement with recent data on USA respondents [18].Her results showed that ideology and environmental values were muchstronger predictors of scepticism than climate change knowledge,concurring with Hulme [19]. Such a finding, if generalizable to otherpopulations, may question the emphasis placed on public educationby many government and environmental agencies seeking to affectchange in climate mitigation and adaptation behaviours amongsttheir citizens.


Current study


I used a survey approach to establish base-line measures ofattitudes and values regarding climate change from a representativesampling of Anglophone Canadians. In particular, I sought toassess scepticism, and determine its variation across several sociodemographic factors, knowledge and values. This is expected toprovide actionable data for environmental policy-makers andcommunicators by, for instance, facilitating more targeted messagingaimed at incentivizing or otherwise influencing climate mitigationbehaviour. While primarily an exploratory study, I also tested severaldiscrete hypotheses:


(i) Western Canada’s oil sands are the country’s greatest andfastest growing GHG-emitting sector [5]. The region enjoys very higheconomic benefit from that industry, with, for instance, $172 billionin wages and salaries projected between 2012 and 2035 [20]. These facts may predict a more acute conflict between pro-environmentalvalues and wealth aspirations for many Western Canadians, and beexpressed as greater climate change scepticism as individuals attemptto resolve the cognitive dissonance [21]. Therefore, I hypothesisedthat scepticism would be higher in respondents from WesternCanada (H1).


(ii) Political conservatism has previously been associatedwith greater climate change scepticism in other countries [17,18],possibly due to the link between support for free-market ideologyand lower pro-environmental values or environmental apathy[22-24]. Therefore, I hypothesized that higher scepticism scoreswould associate negatively with pro-environmental values (H2) andpositively with Conservative Party association (H3).


(iii) Public education on climate change has been very limited andcontrolled in Canada by the incumbent Conservative governmentover the last eight years through various political and bureaucraticmachinations [25,26]. Indeed, the government has been accused of“the construction of ignorance” amongst its citizenry on climatechange [27]. Therefore, I anticipated climate change knowledge tobe relatively low in Canada, and hypothesized it would inverselyassociate with scepticism (H4).


Materials and Methods


Recruitment


Responses were collected using an online survey that employedthe Qualtrics® (Provo, Utah, US) platform. In order to obtain asrepresentative sample of the Canadian adult population as possible,invitations to participate were delivered in January 2014 via mail to13,916 households using the Canada Post Unaddressed TargetedDelivery Service®. This service selects random postal routes withineach province/territory, and guarantees deliver to each householdwithin the selected routes. Invitations to participate were sent to eachprovince/territory in approximate proportion to its population, andincluded houses, apartments, and farm residences. The one-pageinvitation letter briefly outlined the purpose of the study, and statedthat individuals needed to be 18 years or older to participate and thatcompletion of the survey would enter them into a lottery for a $500cash prize. Interested individuals were then directed to a secure URLaddress that housed the survey. To access the survey, respondents hadto enter a unique identifier code provided in each letter. An optionto complete a hard-copy version of the survey was given for thosewithout Internet access. The study has Brock University ResearchEthics Board clearance (File # 12-059).


Demographics


Key demographic characteristics were captured, including age,gender, personal and household income, number of children living athome, country of birth, political orientation (Which federal politicalparty are you most likely to support?), ethnicity/culture most closelyidentified with, and type of community lived in (city, town, villageor hamlet (‘rurality’)). Ethnicity response options were those usedby Statistics Canada, The Government of Canada (http:http://www5.statcan.gc.ca).


Scepticism


To determine the most appropriate measure(s) of scepticism toemploy, I followed the approach of Whitmarsh [17]. Firstly, responsesto 23 attitude statements derived from Whitmarsh were collectedon a 5-point Likert scale. The order of presentation of statementsto participants was fully randomised. Factor Analysis (PCA withvarimax rotation) was then applied to the data using XLStat (version7.5.2, Addinsoft, 40, rue Damremont, 75018 Paris, France). As shownin Table 1, three factors are derived from the analysis. Factor 1accounts for 26% of the variance in the data set, and cumulatively, thethree factors explain 55%. Factor 1 is loaded with items that reflectclimate change uncertainty and scepticism, in close agreement withthe findings of Whitmarsh [22]. Therefore, the responses to the 12statements highlight in Factor 1 (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.887) wereaveraged for each respondent to form this measure of scepticism.


Other measures


Participants were asked their highest education qualificationattained and highest qualification in a ‘science-related subject’, withresponse categories (Table 2) derived from Statistics Canada, TheGovernment of Canada (http:http://www5.statcan.gc.ca).


Table 1: Factor analysis of attitude statements concerning climate change (CC).


After 48 h from burning, the soil of each plot was collected to thedepth of seed position and sieved for seed extraction and counted.Recovered seeds were grouped into persistent and perished seeds. Thepersistent seeds were those that looked healthy from the appearance,while the perished seeds were those charred or lost.


Self-assessed knowledge about climate change was measuredwith two questions: How much, if anything, would you say you knowabout climate change? (6-point scale ranging from ‘Nothing, havenever heard of it’ to ‘A lot’) and How well informed do you consideryourself on the issue of climate change? (6-point scale ranging from ‘Not informed’ to ‘Very well informed’). Finally, environmentalvalues were assessed using the New Environmental Paradigm scale(NEP; 29), as shortened and adapted by Whitmarsh [22]. The sixstatements used were: ‘Humans have the right to modify the naturalenvironment to suit their needs’, ‘Humans are severely abusing theplanet’, ‘Plants and animals have the same rights as humans to exist’,‘Nature is strong enough to cope with the impact of modern industrialnations’, ‘Humans were meant to rule over the rest of nature’, and‘The balance of nature is very delicate and easily upset’, with reversecoding applied to statements 1, 4 and 5.


Data treatment and analysis general approach


All procedures were carried out using XLStat. Scepticism scores(mean, 2.26; SD, 0.88) were standardised (mean = 0), and investigatedusing one-way ANOVA, with the various socio-demographic,knowledge and values factors used as the independent variables.Tukey’s HSD 0.05 was used as the means separation test. Possibleassociations were also examined for quantitative variables usingPearson’s correlation. Linear regression was used to determine therelative effect of socio-demographic, education/ knowledge andvalues measures on standardised scepticism scores.


Results


Sample description


229 respondents completed all or most of the survey, representingan overall response rate of 1.6%. The sample, described in Table 2, is broadly representative of the Canadian adult population with respectto gender, age, immigration status, ethnicity, mean employee income,mean household/family income and rurality [28,29]. With respect todeclared political party orientation for the major political parties, thesample aligns closely with a recent poll on federal vote intentions[30]. There are two noteworthy differences between this sampleand the wider Canadian population. Respondents appear to have asignificantly higher level of education attainment; 52% of this samplereport possessing a Bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 22%of the general adult population [31]. However, in the latter survey,adults were defined as 15 years of age or older, which would artificiallylower the proportion of Bachelor degree holders in comparison to thissample. Secondly, the proportion of respondents from the province ofQuebec is significantly lower than the wider population. This may bebecause the survey was only offered in English; a majority of Quebecresidents report French as the mother tongue [28].


Table 2: Sample demographics and description (n=229).


Scepticism


Table 3 shows total agreement for the 12 individual scepticism statements. Highest agreement was for The media is often too alarmistabout issues like climate change (38% of respondents) and Manyleading experts still question if human activity is contributing to climate change (37%), while the lowest agreement was for I do not believeclimate change is a real problem (8%). Average agreement across allscepticism statements is 2.3, which falls approximately halfway on thescale between disagree a little and neither agree nor disagree.


Table 3: Total agreement for scepticism statements.


Socio-demographic factors


The age of respondents was not linearly associated with scepticismscores (r=-0.00, p=0.99), however one-way ANOVA showed asignificant effect of age categories (F=2.23, p=0.05). Interestingly,scores of participants aged between 40 and 44 yrs were significantlyhigher than for all other age classes (Figure 1 (I)). Scores were notlinearly associated with personal income (r=-0.03, p=0.71), andone-way ANOVA of the major personal income classes (< $5 000,$5 000-$24 999, $25 000-$49 999, $50 000-$74 999, $75 000 andover) showed no effect (F=0.31, p=0.87). Scepticism scores did notvary with household income when the major income groupings ($0-$19 999, $20 000-$39 999, $40 000-$59 999, $60 000-$99 999, $100000-$149 999, $150 000 and over) were analysed (F=0.72, p=0.61),although significant differences were observed between the twoextreme household income groupings (< $30 000 vs. $150 000 andover; t=4.45, p=0.04; Figure 1 (II)). Scores from respondents withthree or more children in their households were significantly higherthan for those with two, one or no children (F=3.28, p=0.02; Figure 1(III)). Respondents whose highest qualification was below a Bachelordegree were significantly more sceptical of climate change than thosewith a Bachelor or graduate degree (t=5.13, p=0.03; Figure 1 (IV)).


By contrast, neither gender (t=1.97, p=0.16), rurality (F=1.59,p=0.21), immigrant status (born in Canada vs. immigrated; t=0.00,p=0.96) nor highest science qualification attained (F=0.76, p=0.52)associated with scepticism. With consideration to respondentlocation, variation between individual provinces and territories could not be examined due to the low number of responses for many cells.However, when the wider geographical regions of Western Canada(British Columbia and Alberta) and Central Canada (Ontario andQuebec) were compared - which captures the four most populatedprovinces and 86% of the Canadian population [28]- respondentsfrom Western Canada showed significantly higher scepticism scores(t=5.83, p=0.02; Figure 1 (V)).


Climate change knowledge, environmental values, andpolitical orientation


Climate change knowledge was assessed by averaging responsesto the questions How much, if anything, would you say you knowabout climate change? and How well informed do you consider yourselfon the issue of climate change? Answers to these two questions weresignificantly correlated (r=0.72, p< 0.0001). To perform ANOVA,responses were coded as low (1-3.5), moderate (4) or high (4.5-6)climate change knowledge; no significant effect was found (F=2.43,p=0.09), although a comparison of the high vs. low knowledge groupsshowed significantly higher scepticism scores in the latter (t=4.83,p=0.03; Figure 1 (VI)).


Figure 1: Influence of selected socio-demographic factors, knowledge and values on climate change scepticism. For each variable (i-viii), means with differentletters are significantly different (Tukey’s HSD 0.05).


The average NEP score in this sample was 3.98 ± 0.72. Asexpected, these scores were inversely associated with climate changescepticism (r=-0.52, p< 0.0001; Figure 2), and an analysis of the topvs. bottom quartiles showed scepticism was substantially greater forrespondents with low NEP scores (t=51.01, p< 0.0001; Figure 1 (VII)).An ANOVA examining political party affiliation (Liberal Party,Conservative Party, New Democratic Party, Green Party, and Other/None/Would not vote) showed significantly higher scepticism scoresfor respondents identifying with the Conservative Party of Canada(F=11.00, p< 0.0001; Figure 1 (VIII)).


Figure 2: Relationship between climate change scepticism and pro-environmental values.


Multivariate analysis


In order to assess the relative contribution to scepticism fromthese diverse variables, I followed the approach of Whitmarsh [22] and used linear regression to separately model the socio-demographic,education/knowledge, and value/politics factors (Table 4). In Model1, which just considered the socio-demographic measures, numberof children in the household - dichotomised as three or more vs. lessthan three - was the only significant variable. When education andknowledge elements were added (Model 2), both gender and numberof children in the household were significant, with - in the case ofgender - males tending to be more sceptical. Highest educationalqualification attained and climate change knowledge were bothsignificantly and inversely predictive of scepticism scores. All foursignificant variables in Model 2 had comparable effect sizes, asevidenced by their similar standardised coefficients (β). However, allfour became non-significant when environmental values and politicalorientation were added to the model, both of which are highlypredictive. Interestingly, region becomes significant in Model 3, reflective of the lower scepticism of respondents from Central Canada.The full model accounts for 35% of the variation in scepticism scores(Table 3). When the three independent variable groups are modelledseparately, socio-demographic variables explain 6% of the variation,education and knowledge 3%, and values and politics account for 31%,highlighting the dominant role of environmental values and politicalorientation in predicting climate change scepticism in this sample.


Table 4: Linear regression analysis of climate change (CC) scepticism scores.


In order to test for mediation, the significant predictors wereregressed onto the socio-demographic and education/knowledgevariables (Table 5). Region is associated with highest educationalqualification, with 66% of Central Canada respondents holding aBachelors degree or higher compared with 41% in other regions.Pro-environmental values are positively associated with (female)gender, and inversely associated with number of children (3 or more). Conservative Party association is positively linked with (male) genderand number of children (3 or more), while inversely associatedwith climate change knowledge. Amongst the mediator variablesthemselves, environmental values are predicted by ConservativeParty association (B=-0.79, β=-0.43, t=-6.67, p< 0.0001), but not byregion (t=-0.56, p=0.56). NEP scores were 19% lower for respondentswho identified with the Conservative Party compared with all otherresponses (t=44.46, p< 0.0001).


Table 5: Linear regression analysis examining mediation of region, environmental values and political orientation.


The most sceptical


As greater opportunities to affect attitudinal and behaviouralchange may exist amongst the more sceptical Canadians, I alsoexamined their socio-demographic, education/knowledge andvalues/politics responses compared to the entire sample in orderto best identify and characterise these individuals. ‘Most sceptical’was defined as a standardised scepticism score of 1 or greater.This corresponded to a mean raw score of 3.8 ± 0.5 for this group, compared with 1.9 ± 0.6 for other respondents; they were twice assceptical about climate change. Their profile is shown in Figure 3.The most sceptical were 2.3 times more likely to vote Conservative,and over 70% more likely to reside in Western Canada. They also hadmore children in their household and were most likely to be male. Asexpected, the NEP scores of the most sceptical were (modestly) lowerthan for the entire sample.


Figure 3: Profile of the most sceptical. Data represent the proportional difference in key measures between respondents with standardised scepticism scoresof 1 or greater and the total sample.


Discussion


Regional and international comparisons (H1)


Overall, there appears to be a general acknowledgement thatclimate change is a problem, with only 8% agreeing with I do notbelieve climate change is a real problem. However, responses tosome of the more nuanced statements are less compelling, with, forinstance, only 44% of respondents disagreeing with the statementClimate change is just a natural fluctuation in earth’s temperatures.This apparent discrepancy may be illustrative of multiple constructsunderlying understanding and expression of scepticism by the public[12]. Some confidence in the robustness of the composite scale usedhere, at least with respect to capturing ‘epistemic scepticism’ [12], isits strong agreement with that derived by Whitmarsh [22] with UKrespondents; the same 12 statements associated with scepticism anduncertainty also loaded on the first factor of her PCA, and also showedgood internal validity. Also noteworthy in this study are the attitudesloading on Factors 2 and 3, with statements in Factor 2 reflective ofdisinterest and need for information, and Factor 3 broadly capturingemotional and moral dimensions of climate change risk perception.


Heath and Gifford previously surveyed a small sample ofCanadians from British Columbia, and measured belief that globalclimate change is occurring [24]. Ecocentrism, environmental apathy, and perceived knowledge were identified as the significantpredictors, with the latter finding in general agreement with theresults reported here (Figure 1 (VI)). The higher scepticism scoresof individuals from Western Canada in the current study may reflectan attempt to resolve the cognitive dissonance created between proenvironmental values and wealth aspirations or goals, facilitatedby the economic dominance of the high GHG-emitting oil sandsindustry in the region (Section 1.3), similar to the “socially-organiseddenial of global warming” in oil-rich Norway reported by Norgaard[32]. This interpretation is supported by the observation that therewere no differences between the average NEP scores of WesternCanadians and respondents from other regions (F=1.84, p=0.18),although it requires further testing.


The composite scepticism scale used here has not been widelyapplied in other countries, which makes direct comparisons withother populations more challenging. However, Whitmarsh [22],using the same index, reported average climate change scepticismscores in the UK public of 2.7 and 2.9 in 2003 and 2008, respectively,suggesting modestly higher overall scepticism than observed in thisstudy, although time frames are obviously different. More recently,the data of Leiserowitz et al. [18] suggest Americans - Canada’s closestneighbours - are significantly more sceptical, with, for example, 23%of USA respondents reporting they do not believe global warming ishappening. Interestingly, the authors also report that this scepticismincreased in the USA during 2013.


Politics and values (H2 &H3)


Conservative political association was a strong predictor ofclimate change scepticism in the current study, in agreement withUSA and UK findings [17,33]. This result is likely driven, at least in part, by the lower environmental concern of Canadians holdingconservative political values, which concurs with previous studies(see 23 for a review). Environmental protection - and via extension,climate change mitigation – involves government intervention intofree markets, which conflicts with conservative values [34]. Similarly,individuals with free-market ideology are more likely to believe that‘the market’ will solve all problems, including environmental, and thusare more sceptical about climate change [24]. A closer examination ofresponses shows a significant interaction between political associationand highest educational qualification attained (F=15.85, p=0.045).While higher educational attainment (dichotomised as belowBachelor or above Bachelor degree) associated with lower scepticismfor non-Conservatives, Conservative voters with a Bachelor degree orhigher were more sceptical of climate change than those with lowerattainment (data not shown). This result agrees with the findingsof McCright and Dunlap [34], although it is not due to lower proenvironmentalvalues in the more highly educated Conservatives, assuggested by Zhou [23]; the interaction between political orientationand education was not significant for NEP scores (F=0.71, p=0.40).


Pro-environmental values were the strongest independentpredictor of climate change scepticism, in concurrence withWhitmarsh [22]. Notably, the predictive power (β)and directionof both political and environmental values and their relative effectsize compared with other variables examined are very similar to herfindings for UK respondents, perhaps suggestive that this result mightgeneralize to other predominantly Anglophone countries as well.


Climate change knowledge (H4)


It is often assumed that a low level of climate change education orunderstanding is a major contributor to scepticism and inaction - theso-called ‘knowledge-deficit model’ [35] - and therefore policy andother activities are best to focus on public education. However, selfreportedclimate change knowledge did not differ (t= 0.30, P=0.58)between the most sceptical (mean=4.35) and other (mean=4.25)respondents in this study, and only 1.2% of the overall variance inscepticism scores was attributable to knowledge of climate change inthis regression model. To the extent that climate change knowledgeis linked to scientific literacy, these findings are consistent with thoseof Kahan et al. [36], who did not find support for the hypothesisthat limited scientific literacy and understanding of climate changeunderlies public apathy and scepticism. Some caution should beapplied in interpreting our results, however, as objective measures ofclimate change knowledge, such as those used by Tobler et al. [37],were not obtained here.


These results suggest there may be a relatively low return oninterventions focused solely or even primarily on climate changeeducation in Canada. A possible exception may be for Conservativevoters, who report lower overall knowledge of climate change, perhapsreflective of the current Conservative government’s substantial effortsto centralize and restrict messaging about climate change and itsimpacts and/or simple apathy [24,27].


Limitations and Other considerations


A limitation of the study is the lower than expected response rate,and thus relatively small sample size. This reduces confidence in the representativeness of the sample, and may have underpowered someanalyses. While the sample demographics are generally representativeof the Canadian adult population, inclusion of a French version ofthe survey to capture more responses from Quebec would have beenappropriate. A larger sampling in the future may enable a robustsegmentation of the Canadian public, similar to the Six Americasinitiative on attitudes and beliefs about global warming in the USA[33], which may ultimately assist in more targeted and effectivecommunications around climate mitigation and adaptation.


Non-response bias is also an inherent problem in researchthat seeks a representative sampling of a population’s attitudes orbehaviour. In this instance, it is possible that Canadians who are themost sceptical about climate change are those least likely to complete asurvey on climate change perception. A significant financial incentivefor participation in the study was included to try and mitigate thisrisk.


As noted by Whitmarsh [22], climate sceptics base theirbeliefs on ideology, rather than evidence; a view supported by theprimacy of political association and pro-environmental values inthe current study. Communications strategies based on climatechange ‘education’ are therefore less likely to be effective in the mostsceptical, as the information will be interpreted within the context oftheir existing values and worldviews, which are difficult to change.Instead, climate messaging for this group may be more effectiveif framed around other issues, such as energy independence andsecurity [17]. For the less sceptical, communication campaigns maybe best advised to avoid sensationalism or alarmist approaches, asmany Canadians already attribute the media with such hyperbole onclimate change, and alarmist communication may lead to less publicengagement and lower motivation for mitigation behavior [38].Finally, structural interventions that foster pro-environmental valuesmay be an effective long-term strategy in Canada, although furtherresearch is needed to elucidate how climate change communicationand policy can be tailored and optimised, given the diversity of publicscepticism and values.


Conclusion


Scepticism and uncertainty represent potentially powerfulpsychological barriers to individuals taking meaningful action onclimate mitigation and adaptation. This exploratory study surveyed arepresentative sample of the Canadian adult population to determinetheir level of climate change scepticism and how it varies with selectsocio-demographic, knowledge/education and value dimensions.H1 was confirmed: respondents from Western Canada were moresceptical about climate change than those from the other regionsexamined, which may be interpreted as a strategy for resolvingcognitive dissonance between pro-environmental values and wealthaspirations. H2 and H3 were confirmed: scepticism scores werenegatively associated with pro-environmental values, and were higherfor respondents with a Conservative Party orientation. Indeed, thesetwo factors were the strongest predictors of climate change scepticismof all measures assessed. H4 was partially confirmed. While a fullfactor regression model failed to identify climate change knowledgeas a significant predictor, scepticism was modestly higher in lowknowledgerespondents compared to high- knowledge respondents. The most highly sceptical of all Canadians are male, ConservativeParty voters living in Western Canada with a greater number ofchildren in their household.


The baseline data reported here will allow changes in climatescepticism in Canada to be tracked over time, including evaluationof the efficacy of various interventions aimed at encouraging climatechange mitigation behaviours. Taken together, these findingshighlight the importance of ideology and values in shaping beliefson climate change, and illustrate the heterogeneity of empiricalscepticism in a population, which in turn may underlie variation inlevels of mitigation engagement. This suggests that messaging andpolicy strategies on climate mitigation might need to be differentiatedand optimised for different segments of the public.


Acknowledgements


The Environmental Sustainability Research Centre and theCouncil for Research in the Social Sciences, Brock University, aresincerely thanked for funding that supported this project. SamanthaMorris, Dr Ryan Plummer, Hannah Pickering (Brock University),and Kerrie Pickering (Green Health Global) are thanked for valuabletechnical and editorial assistance.


Declaration of conflicting interests


The author declares no potential conflicts of interests with respectto the authorship and/or publication of this article.


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