Scientists have been sounding the alarm bell about anthropogenic climate change for years. However, their cries have been falling upon deaf ears. Atmospheric CO2 concentrations and global mean temperatures continue to rise, and the disastrous effects of climate change are being felt more acutely than ever. So, why on earth aren’t we doing more about it? In a 2007 article, climate scientist Prof Steve Running proposed the 5 stages of climate grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance [1]. Running suggests that only once people have reached stage 5 will they start acting seriously on climate change. I will hereby argue why failures to communicate scientific uncertainty in a clear, concise, and consistent way can cause people to get stuck in the early stages of climate grief and can ultimately lead to climate inaction.
Running defines the first stage of climate grief as ‘denial’, encompassing both the outright denial that the earth is warming or denial of human causation. Often scientific uncertainty is misquoted in justification of this position. This is in part due to the historically destructive agenda of big oil companies. Concerned about the potential damage of climate literacy to profit, oil companies like Chevron, Exxon and BP set out on a path to create confusion and promote climate change ignorance among the public. For example, a 1988 Exxon Memo on the greenhouse effect laid out Exxon’s strategy to “emphasise the uncertainty in scientific conclusions regarding the potential enhanced greenhouse effect” [2]. While studies have found multiple factors that contribute to individuals becoming stuck at the stage of climate change denial [3], targeted misinformation including miscommunication of uncertainty is recognised to be a significant contributor.
The second stage of climate grief is ‘anger’, and primarily refers to those who see climate action as a direct attack on their lifestyles. This stage is closely related to the previous stage and is likely to also be influenced by the shadow of doubt cast by corporate strategists. Overemphasising the uncertainty around the effects of climate change and the influence of humans also undoubtedly leads people to question the justification of demands that we enact large-scale systemic change to achieve carbon neutrality.
The third stage of climate grief is ‘bargaining’. This stage of climate grief favours the idealists and gives rise to statements such as, “a longer growing season won’t be such a bad thing” or “I wouldn’t mind having a milder summer.” During this stage, people cherry-pick the potentially positive impacts of climate change and ignore the less favourable effects. Increases in summer temperatures and length of the growing season concern averages and as such are easily contextualised in a conversation about climate change. The uncertainties associated with these predictions are significantly lower than any uncertainty surrounding predictions of specific extreme weather events such as the occurrence of a particular hurricane. However, this is purely due to the complexity of predicting specific extreme weather events. What can be predicted with less uncertainty is that the frequency of extreme weather events will increase. Uncertainty around increases in summer temperatures and the length of the growing season should be placed in the same context as uncertainty surrounding the increased frequency of extreme weather events. Failure to do so allows the perpetuation of the false narrative that the positive effects of climate change carry less uncertainty than the negative effects. Otherwise, it’s perfectly natural for people to latch onto idealised outcomes of climate change and be prevented from obtaining a realistic perspective on the issue.
The penultimate stage of climate grief is depression, the stage at which individuals feel overwhelmed by the scale of the problem and unconvinced by the plausibility of the solutions. I concede that there are many factors contributing to people getting stuck at this stage. Even when uncertainty is properly communicated, the scale of the issue of climate change is inherently overwhelming and Running states that even those who are optimally informed can retreat from the ‘acceptance’ to ‘depression’ stage from time to time. Despite this, I would argue that failure to correctly communicate the uncertainty surrounding – for example – the upper limits of the climate sensitivity parameter can lead to an underestimation of uncertainty and thus promote an overly pessimistic attitude towards future projections.
Communication of uncertainty evidently requires a clear, concise, and consistent approach that minimises ambiguity and optimises comprehensibility. However, I would be wary of the implications of Running’s theory; that action on climate change is dependent on individual behaviour. Rather, I believe that it is large-scale systemic change that is fundamental for mitigating the effects of climate change. However, I recognise that businesses and politicians are motivated by public values. As such, failures to effectively communicate uncertainty could reduce the demand for climate action and thus inhibit the realisation of systemic change.
References:
[1] Running, Steven W., “The 5 Stages of Climate Grief” (2007). Numerical Terradynamic Simulation Group Publications. 173. https://scholarworks.umt.edu/ntsg_pubs/173
[2]- 1988 Exxon Memo on the Greenhouse Effect http://www.chttp://www.climatefiles.com/exxonmobil/566/
[3]- Treen KMd, Williams HTP, O’Neill SJ. Online misinformation about climate change. WIREs Clim Change. 2020;11:e665. https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.665
Thanks for the post! I found the concept of climate grief really interesting. I agree with Ximena’s point. Definitely, acceptance is the starting point for an action to take place but is just the acceptance of the fact enough to induce action?
I find many accept the fact that climate change does exist but only a few are really motivated to do something about it. Does the magnitude of the problem also play a role here? That is when there is a perception that a problem is so huge that individual action won’t make a big difference then the mere acceptance of the fact may not be enough. So, I feel the transition from acceptance to action is not always linear and may be dependent on the context of the problem along with other external factors.
I really enjoyed reading your text! Thank you for introducing this concept about the stages of grief; I totally agree that action can only come from a standing point of acceptance. Only when a situation is accepted, you will act on it. I especially liked the fact that I could resemble myself in the different stages you mention, and I find it interesting that is not a linear process. I, for example, have been during my life experiencing a back and ford in some of these stages. I would also add that new pieces of information regarding the climate crisis, or inputs that you had not consider before, could through you back to an earlier stage. For example, when I was introduced for the first time to all the uncertainty surrounding the models, I was for a moment back into denial or anger; I would just think: so we are not even sure about this? Therefore, it is relevant to say that climate grief may not be linear and each person has their own timing. Lastly, I would also question if acceptance will always lead to action; because it seems to me that it could also lead to a sense of impotence. So you may accept the situation but feel overwhelmed and incapable of influencing it.
Nice text! I especially agree with your personal assessment at the end, that climate change action is too often seen to be dependent on individual behavior, while large-scale systematic is required for effective mitigation measures. Nonetheless, a very interesting take on individual responses to the subjective understanding of climate change and the surrounding uncertainties. I would be interested if this subdivision of public responses to scientific uncertainties can be transferred to other political topics, such as the corona crisis. Additionally, I personally wonder if the division into successive stages is not a false equivalency, while individual stances on topics seem to be more static than dynamic. And thus, I am not totally sure if correct communication of uncertainties can help people progress from one stage to the next. I would see it more as a visualization of an intensity distribution with correct uncertainty communication being the key to directly introduce people to the later stages (FFF and so on).