Determinants of risk perception and willingness to tackle climate change. A pilot study

Abstract

Different research papers have demonstrated that risk perception related to climate change can be attributed to different variables such as general environmental beliefs, knowledge about climate change and self-efficacy (Heath and Gifford, 2006; Sundblad, Biel and Gärling, 2007). However, the lack of agreement in the work carried out so far and the need to define specific scales of attitudes towards climate change indicate that further research must be conducted along these lines. This pilot study analyzes the determinants of risk perception and behavioral intentions in relation to climate change found in the literature. A Likert-type scale was developed to assess the following variables: knowledge, attitudes towards climate change and self-efficacy as predictive variables and risk perception and behavioral intentions as criteria variables. This scale was tested on 84 university students. The internal consistency of the scale was acceptable for all variables with the exception of attitude toward climate change where consistency was low. The results of the regression analyses showed that 44% of the variance observed in risk perception related to climate change can be explained by the level of knowledge, attitudes toward climate change and self-efficacy. 17% of the variance observed in relation to behavioral intentions can be predicted by attitudes toward climate change and self-efficacy.