Communicating climate change: history, challenges, process and future directions
AIMED AT: Public and policy makers PURPOSE: The core of the paper focuses on key aspects of the communication process (purpose and scope of the communication, audience, framing, messages, messengers, modes and channels of communication, and assessing the outcomes and effectiveness of a communication). GEOGRAPHICAL AREA: Global TECHNICAL AREA: Communicating climate change BASIC STRUCTURE: Today, after more than 20 years of scientific progress and a much greater scientific consensus, public climate change communication is no longer just a communication between experts. Thanks to media, it is now something that is discussed in general public. Concern, sense of urgency, and importance vary greatly across populations, and understanding of the causes and the stakes remains limited. The very purpose of climate change communication and audience choice are closely linked. The purpose of climate change communication is a critical first consideration. The second basic purpose of communication efforts is to achieve some type and level of social engagement and action. The third category of communication efforts aims even deeper by trying to foster not just political action or context-specific behavior modification, but to bring about changes in social norms and cultural values that act more broadly. If a particular communication goal has been set and an audience chosen, the way in which the climate change story is told is an inevitable element of communication, a powerful influence on how the audience is to interpret the information provided, and a strategically important choice. Frames construct a problem, provide a perspective from which to interpret it, even help us perceive some aspects of it, while disregarding or overlooking others, and deeply influence how persuasive we find the information being communicated. The message of climate change communication depends on who the audience is, who conveys the message, the channel through which a message is being conveyed; the place and context in which audiences receive the information, how they are likely to process the message received, the goals of the communication. But despite this context- dependency, some general guidelines can be provided. Messengers are integral aspects of the framing; they are also critically important in establishing the credibility of the information conveyed.
Communicating climate change: history, challenges, process and future directions.pdf
