Ann Bostrom Finds that Stronger Efficacy Beliefs are Associated with Greater Support for Reducing Climate Change Risks
Posted: 11/26/2018 (CSDE Research)
In her recently published article, “Efficacy, Action, and Support for Reducing Climate Change Risks,” Ann Bostrom, CSDE Affiliate and Professor of Environmental Policy at the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance, investigates the effect of believing that action to reduce climate change risks is both possible and effective on sustaining risk mitigation efforts.
The article makes three contributions: First, it presents a theoretically motivated approach to measuring climate change mitigation efficacy; Second, it tests this in two national survey samples, demonstrating largely coherent beliefs by level of action and discrimination between types of efficacy; Third, it employs the resulting efficacy scales in mediation models to test how well efficacy beliefs predict climate change policy support, controlling for specific knowledge, risk perceptions, and ideology, and allowing for mediation by concern. Bostrom finds that stronger government and collective response efficacy beliefs and personal self‐efficacy beliefs are both directly and indirectly associated with greater support for reducing the risks of climate change, even after controlling for ideology and causal beliefs about climate change.