Communicating Climate Risk Handbook.
Ahead of COP26, experts from UK universities delivered a three day conference showcasing the latest research on climate risk: the Climate Risk Summit (29 Sept-1 Oct 2021). The virtual Summit, funded and coordinated by the COP26 Universities Network, featured an interactive workshop dedicated to the communication of climate risk. The UCL Climate Action Unit delivered this communication workshop in partnership with the AU4DM Network; drawing on the interdisciplinary expertise of both teams.
This handbook expands on the key ideas the UCL Climate Action Unit introduced to workshop participants. Its content is designed specifically for those working at the interface of climate science and policy. This resource is for researchers and academics who want their work to have an impact with policymakers.
‘Communicating climate risk: a handbook’ explains insights from psychology and neuroscience on how our brains engage with the idea of climate risk, it highlights journalism hacks for writing about risk clearly, it shares lessons learned from the team’s experience working with policymakers on climate risk, and it offers a set of useful questions to help other researchers ascertain what policymakers need from climate risk research.
It is a practical guide to communicating climate risk. The need for it has never been greater
Insight
Elephant and Rider: for people to ‘get’ climate risk, speak to their elephant.
Our brains think in two qualitatively different ways: intuitive thinking and deliberative reasoning. Neither is necessarily right or wrong, nor necessarily rational or irrational. They coexist and are brought to the fore in different circumstances. A useful metaphor to understand how they interact is that of an Elephant for the intuitive, automatic side of our brains, and the much smaller Rider for the deliberative side. Up to 95% or more of what brains do is situated within the Elephant, outside of conscious control and awareness. Conventional wisdom holds that the Rider––reasoning––is in control (or ought to be). What the science shows, however, is that the Elephant determines the direction of travel most of the time. The Rider’s primary role is not to ‘think rationally’ (as commonly assumed), but to rationalise and justify where the Elephant is heading.
Elephant and Rider work together in evaluating situations of risk, but it is only when our brains can evaluate a risk intuitively
that we easily ‘get’ what the problem is. What each individual person processes intuitively (or not) is shaped by their prior experiences and professional expertise. Any abstract issue (like climate change) or metric (like average global temperature) can––over time––become internalised into our Elephants and acquire a ‘felt’ sense of risk. This happens when we become subject experts, or when we become passionately engaged with the issue. However, without the right exposure, abstract problems may not generate any intuitive risk response at all. [As] scientists, policymakers, and politicians are governed by their Elephants too, the same applies to them as does to all of us: particular risks may ‘jump out,’ while others do not. For
decision makers, it is the risks that ‘jump out’ that are of their primary concern. Risks that do not may leave them indifferent or make it much harder to grasp the problem.
For people to ‘get’ climate risk, you have to connect to their Elephant: try to link the hazard or impact you research to the
concerns which a particular target audience already understands (see ‘Risk currencies,’ page 11). This means it’s a good idea to start with listening to find out their concerns (see ‘Focus on listening,’ page 12).
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Link to | Communicating Climate Risk Handbook.
This document can be cited as:
Roberts, De Meyer & Hubble-Rose, 2021. Communicating climate risk: a handbook, Climate Action
Unit, University College London. London, United Kingdom. DOI: 10.14324/000.rp.10137325
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