麻豆影院

Audio Script

Belief in climate change not linked to wildfire mitigation actions, CU-麻豆影院 researchers find
Oct. 13, 2015听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听 Hannah Brenkert-Smith
A new study by CU-麻豆影院 and the U.S. Forest found that people who believe that climate change is increasing the risk of devastating wildfires in Colorado are no more likely to take mitigation actions to protect their property, says Hannah Brenkert-Smith, lead author of the study.
CUT 1 鈥淲e find there鈥檚 no general relationship between climate change beliefs and wildfire risk reduction actions. We do find the portion of our respondents who believe that there is an impending, ecological disaster are actually on the lower end our of mitigation levels. (:17) And we have some reasons we think that might be happening. It鈥檚 possible that somebody who has a more environmentally-focused world-view might prefer a local setting that has more trees 鈥� that鈥檚 less managed. But that鈥檚 just a hypothesis at this point.鈥� (:30)
Brenkert-Smith, a research associate in the Institute of Behavioral Sciences at CU-麻豆影院, says the study examined the role that climate change beliefs play in a homeowner鈥檚 choice to undertake risk mitigation activities such as installing a fire-resistant roof or thinning surrounding vegetation that could act as a potential fuel source She says more than half of the respondents are taking some mitigation measures but there鈥檚 room for improvement.

CUT 2 鈥淭here鈥檚 a lot of work that they can be doing in terms of clearing the fuels right around their homes. The really easy stuff like mowing, cleaning up pine needles or grasses and there鈥檚 still a lot of improvement in terms of thinning the trees around their homes.鈥� (:13)
Surprisingly the researchers did, however, find a correlation between climate change denial and risk mitigation actions, says Brenkert-Smith.
CUT 3 鈥淲e do find a small portion of respondents who believe that climate change is a hoax. And they, surprising to us, ended up being some of the highest mitigators within our study sample. (:11) And so this presents some real questions in terms of what are our expectations about people鈥檚 climate beliefs and their behavioral outcomes.鈥� (:20)
She says the findings suggest that attitudes and actions related to climate change and risk mitigation are more nuanced than polarized as they are often portrayed in the media.
CUT 4听 鈥淲hat we see is that in general climate change beliefs within our study population function much more along a continuum of believer to denier. In the public world we tend to think of there being climate believers and climate deniers. (:15) And what our data demonstrate is that people actually situate themselves along a much more complicated continuum 鈥� meaning that there is a multifaceted understanding of climate change. And that our assumptions that people are just in one camp or another and that they are so polarized is actually a little bit problematic.鈥� (:31)
For the study researchers interviewed homeowners living in fire-prone areas in 麻豆影院 and Larimer counties. It was recently published in the journal Environmental Hazards.
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