Abstract
National data from the 2018 Australian Survey of Social Attitudes show that knowledge of climate change is positively associated with the scientific consensus position on anthropogenic climate change. Responses to factual quiz questions that include climate trigger terms such as “greenhouse gas” or reference to increased ocean temperature and acidification are influenced by one’s political party identification, with Liberal and National party identifiers tending to score lower than Labor partisans on climate knowledge scales. Yet, responses to climate-related factual questions sans trigger terms are not influenced by political partisanship. Climate skeptics tend to score lower on climate knowledge scales than those who accept anthropogenic climate change, although skeptics also tend to have inflated confidence in their factual knowledge of climate change.
Highlights
Several studies have estimated that between 90% and 100% of climate scientists agree that anthropogenic climate change (ACC) is occurring (Anderegg et al, 2010; Cook et al, 2013; Doran & Zimmerman, 2009; Oreskes, 2004; Powell, 2015), while a recent survey administered by Cook et al (2016) found 97% of peer-reviewed climate scientists agree global warming has mainly anthropogenic causes
The results indicate that Australians are less confident than Americans regarding their knowledge of climate change, with 30% of Australians overconfident compared to 47% of Americans (Hamilton, 2015, p. 101)
Analysis of data from the 2018 Australian Survey of Social Attitudes (Evans et al, 2018) indicates that approximately two-thirds of Australians accept the scientific consensus on ACC consistent with the findings of earlier studies (Tranter, 2017, 2019)
Summary
Several studies have estimated that between 90% and 100% of climate scientists agree that anthropogenic climate change (ACC) is occurring (Anderegg et al, 2010; Cook et al, 2013; Doran & Zimmerman, 2009; Oreskes, 2004; Powell, 2015), while a recent survey administered by Cook et al (2016) found 97% of peer-reviewed climate scientists agree global warming has mainly anthropogenic causes. In the United States, political divisions over the acceptance of ACC are moderated by education level and knowledge of climate change (e.g., Ehret et al, 2017; Hamilton et al, 2015) such associations vary according to political affiliations.
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