Climate Change and Heuristics

Climate change is an issue of global concern, described as a shift in the worldwide climate patterns attributed to a rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. It is an issue that has attracted international attention due to its adverse effect on global biodiversity and human health. Climate change is attributed to human activities since the 20th-century, proceeding over decades to millennia. An increase in carbon IV oxide level has a significant effect on plants, animals, and human beings. It has resulted in to increase in the average global temperate by 1.6 degrees Celsius every year. The United States and China are the largest emitters of gases to the atmosphere that affect the climate globally. It is estimated that the two countries contributed more than 43 % of world emissions. Climate change has become one of the biggest threats to prosperity, and there is a need for various interventions to minimize the effects of climate change. The Paris Agreement signed in December 2015 was a strategy used to curb climate change globally for the post-2020 period. Many countries signed the agreement as a global response to threats of climate change. 

According to Hamilton (2010), the general public's concern is less than the impact or adverse effect it can cause despite increased public awareness efforts. Yu & Yu (2017); Whitmarsh (2011) conducted a study to examine people's attitudes regarding climate change based on political ideology and the perceived risks of climate change. It was revealed that the message's source plays a significant role in developing public trust. Pornpitakpan (2004); Tormala, Briñol, & Petty (2006) established that perceived credibility and confidence in the source of a persuasive message is vital towards public attitude. It found out that an individual will change the attitude when the message source is trustworthy and credible. Pornpitakpan (2004) established that perceived self-interest does not significantly affect the message's credibility and trustworthiness. 

Further, Elphinstone, Farrugia, Critchley & Eigenberger (2014) revealed a negative association between the trust of the message and concerns raised on climate change. Hence, this contributed to the significance of trust in public issues, for example, climate change (Malka et al., 2009). Little attention has been given to the trust in the message and epistemic style. Therefore, this study aims to examine the epistemic style in predicting faith in the message. It will be assessing what happens to climate change based on the source of the news, vested interest, and trust of the message. 

Aim 

To examine if the source's perceived self-interest affects trust in the message and whether this effect is different between the for individuals with high in I.P. and low in I.P. 

To assess if there is a relationship linking the trust in the message and general concern about climate change. Also, to examine if there is a difference in the association linking individuals high in I.P. and low in I.P. 

Hypothesis 

We will examine if epistemic preference (high I.P. vs. low I.P.) can moderate the perceived self-interest sources' effects on trust in the message. This is assessed by conducting the t-test to compare the two groups of the epistemic preference (high I.P. and low I.P.). Further, it will be expected that people who have high I.P. are more likely to trust the message and concerns about climate change. 

Methods 

Design 

In the study, all participants read an article that discussed the importance of increasing public funding for research and development of electric vehicles. Half of all participants read that an engineering researcher employed by GreenFutures wrote the article. GreenFutures was described as a company focused on developing technology to improve electric cars. Thus, this represents the Vested Interest condition. The other Half of the participants read that the article was written by an engineering researcher employed by the Australian Coal Association. The Australian Coal Association was described as an industry body that looks after its member companies - the black coal producers in Australia. Thus, this represents the Non-Vested Interest condition. Essentially, the source's perceived vested interest was manipulated between the two conditions, and participants were randomly assigned to view one of these two conditions. Also, participants completed the Epistemic Preference Indicator Revised (Elphinstone et al. 2014). A median split will be used to create two groups to differentiate people high in I.P. and low in IP1 

The study was conducted as a 2 (Vested Interest vs. Non-vested interest) x 2(Epistemic style: High I.P. vs. Low I.P.) x between-subjects experimental design. The design is between subjects because each respondent only saw one version of the article. Each participant is either high I.P. or low I.P. It is a 2 x 2 design because there are two independent variables, each with two levels: perceived self-interest of the source (Vested Interest vs. Non-vested Interest) and Epistemic Style (high I.P. vs. low I.P.)2. These manipulations created four separate groups, and each participant was in one of the following: 

1. Vested Interest; High I.P. 

2. Vested Interest; Low I.P. 

3. Non-vested Interest; High I.P. 

4. Non-vested Interest; Low I.P. 

Independent variables: 

Independent variable 1: Vested Interest. 

We manipulated this variable by telling participants that the article was written by either a research engineer working for GreenFutures (who develop technology to improve electric cars) or a research engineer working for the Australian Coal Association (who represent Australian black coal producers). GreenFutures represents the Vested Interest condition, and the Australian Coal Association represents the Non-vested interest condition. 

Independent variable 2: Epistemic Style 

Participants in this study complete the Epistemic Preference Indicator Revised. We will create the Epistemic Style variable using a median split of participants' scores on the Epistemic Preference Indicator Revised. Based on this, participants will either be classified as High I.P. or Low I.P. 

Dependent variables: 

There were two critical dependent variables: 

Trust in the message: 

After reading the vignette, participants were asked, "After reading the article written by the (GreenFutures / Australian Coal Association) researcher, how much do you trust the information presented in the article?” 

Concern over climate change: 

To gauge the level of concern over climate change, participants were asked: "How worried are you about climate change?” 

Henceforth, the critical variables in this study will be labeled as follows: 

IV_VestedInterest: This was an independent variable (manipulated by the experimenter), with two levels: Vested Interest and Non-vested Interest, 

IV_IP : This was an independent variable (measured/created by the experimenter), with two levels: High I.P. and Low I.P. 

DV_Trust : This was a dependent variable (measured), indicating participants’ trust in the message DV_Concern: This was a dependent variable (measured), showing participants' general concern over climate change. 

Materials/Measures and Procedure 

Participants undertook the experiment via the Qualtrics survey platform. Participants were directed to the study link, where they first viewed a brief description of the study and offered informed consent. (Any students who did not wish to participate in the study and did not provide consent were directed to the debriefing). 

Participants who consented to take part read a modified version of an article (the original version is available here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davekeating/2020/05/19/it-turns-out-covid-isnt-helpingthe-climate/#11690412273e ). Half of the participants were told that it was written by an engineering researcher employed by Green Futures (a company focused on developing technology to improve electric cars). The other Half of the participants read that the article was written by an engineering researcher employed by the Australian Coal Association (an industry body that looks after its member companies - the black coal producers in Australia). Following the article, participants were asked to rate their trust in the information presented in the article. They then completed a series of attention checks and manipulation checks. These were included in determining if the participant had properly read the article and registered the information about manipulations. Following the attention and manipulation checks, participants completed demographic questions (gender, age, ethnic background, and political orientation), and also the Epistemic Preference Scale-Revised (Elphinstone et al. 2014), an environmental concern scale (Schultz, 2001), and modified version of the 15-item climate change concern scale from Maibach et al. (2011). The modification involved changing the United States to Australia in survey items. Following the completion of the survey, participants were presented with a debriefing statement explaining the study's aims and reason for the very slight deception (i.e., the author and immediacy manipulations). 

Results 

Participant demographic characteristics 

IV_VestedInterest
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Non-vested interest condition	37	42.0	42.0	42.0
	Vested interest condition	51	58.0	58.0	100.0
	Total	88	100.0	100.0

Most of the participants had vested interest condition consisting of 58 % (n = 51) and those with non-vested interest condition were 42 % (n = 37). 

IV_IP
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	High I.P.	39	44.3	44.3	44.3
	Low I.P.	49	55.7	55.7	100.0
	Total	88	100.0	100.0

Most of the participants were of low IP consisting of 55.7 % (n = 49) and those on the high IP were (n = 39, 44.3 %). 

How worried are you about climate change?
		Frequency	Percent	Valid Percent	Cumulative Percent
Valid	Very worried	38	43.2	43.2	43.2
	Somewhat worried	35	39.8	39.8	83.0
	Not very worried	12	13.6	13.6	96.6
	Not at all worried	3	3.4	3.4	100.0
	Total	88	100.0	100.0

Most of the participants were very worried about climate change ( n = 38, 43.2 %). Thirty-five participants were somewhat concerned about climate change comprising of 39.8 %. The participants who were not very worried consisted of 13.6 % ( n = 12). The least number of participants were not at all concerned about climate change ( n = 3, 3.4 %). 

Descriptive Statistics
	N	Minimum	Maximum	Mean	Std. Deviation
DV_Trust	88	2.00	9.00	6.1932	1.76725
Valid N (listwise)	88

The above table shows the participants’ trust in the message. It indicates that DV-Trust (M = 6.1932, SD = 1.76725) with a maximum value of 9 and a minimum of 2. 

Testing your hypotheses 

Research Question 1. Does the perceived self-interest of a source influence trust in the message? 

Previous research has established that vested interests are less trusted than sources that do not have vested interests in the argument. In your data set, is there an effect of vested interest on trust? 

Group Statistics
	IV_VestedInterest	N	Mean	Std. Deviation	Std. Error Mean
DV_Trust	Non-vested interest condition	37	5.9459	1.95712	.32175
	Vested interest condition	51	6.3725	1.61197	.22572

Independent Samples Test
		Levene's Test for Equality of Variances		t-test for Equality of Means
		F	Sig.	t	df	Sig. (2-tailed)	Mean Difference	Std. Error Difference	95% Confidence Interval of the Difference
									Lower	Upper
DV_Trust	Equal variances assumed	2.793	.098	-1.119	86	.266	-.42660	.38109	-1.18418	.33097
	Equal variances not assumed			-1.085	68.252	.282	-.42660	.39303	-1.21083	.35762

Levene’s test is not significant (F = 2.793, p = 0.98). Therefore there is equality of variances between each condition. The test statistic, t (86) = -1.119, p = 0.266. This implies that the difference between Non-vested interest and Vested interest conditions in the trust is insignificant. The mean difference is -0.42660, suggesting that the vested interest condition's mean is higher than the non-vested condition. At a 95 % confidence level, the mean difference lies between -1.18418 and 0.33097. 

Research Question 2: Does vested interest on trust in the message depend on Epistemic preference? 

His question addresses if the vested interest on trust is equal for individuals with low I.P. and high I.P. Looking at each epistemic preference group separately (high versus low I.P.), is there a difference in the effect of vested interest on trust? 

Group Statistics
IV_IP		IV_VestedInterest	N	Mean	Std. Deviation	Std. Error Mean
High IP	DV_Trust	Non-vested interest condition	16	5.7500	2.01660	.50415
		Vested interest condition	23	6.9130	1.12464	.23450
Low IP	DV_Trust	Non-vested interest condition	21	6.0952	1.94691	.42485
		Vested interest condition	28	5.9286	1.82429	.34476

Independent Samples Test
IV_IP			Levene's Test for Equality of Variances		t-test for Equality of Means
			F	Sig.	T	df	Sig. (2-tailed)	Mean Difference	Std. Error Difference	95% Confidence Interval of the Difference
										Lower	Upper
High IP	DV_Trust	Equal variances assumed	8.386	.006	-2.306	37	.027	-1.16304	.50440	-2.18506	-.14103
		Equal variances not assumed			-2.092	21.507	.048	-1.16304	.55602	-2.31770	-.00839
Low IP	DV_Trust	Equal variances assumed	.338	.564	.308	47	.760	.16667	.54197	-.92364	1.25698
		Equal variances not assumed			.305	41.638	.762	.16667	.54714	-.93778	1.27112

At high I.P., the conditions for Non-vested interest and Vested interest in trust are significantly different (t (37) = -2.306, p =0.027). The mean difference is -1.16304, suggesting that the average of the vested interest condition is higher than the non-vested. At low I.P., there is an insignificant difference between the conditions for Non-vested interest and Vested interest in the trust (t (47) = 0.308, p =0.760). The mean difference is 0.16667, suggesting that the vested interest's mean conditions are lower than the non-vested state. 

Research Question 3. Does the relationship between perceptions of trust in the message and concern over climate change depend on Epistemic Preference? 

Correlations
IV_IP			How worried are you about climate change?	DV_Trust
High I.P.	How worried are you about climate change?	Pearson Correlation	1	-.450 **
		Sig. (2-tailed)		.004
		N	39	39
	DV_Trust	Pearson Correlation	-.450 **	1
		Sig. (2-tailed)	.004
		N	39	39
Low I.P.	How worried are you about climate change?	Pearson Correlation	1	-.235
		Sig. (2-tailed)		.104
		N	49	49
	DV_Trust	Pearson Correlation	-.235	1
		Sig. (2-tailed)	.104
		N	49	49
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

At a high I.P., the Pearson correlation coefficient is -0.450, p = 0.004. This implies that the relationship linking the trust in the message and concern about climate change is weak and negative. The relationship is statistically significant since the p-value is less compared to alpha = 0.05 ( p < 0.01). 

At a low IP, the Pearson correlation coefficient is, r = -0.235, p = 0.104. Hence, for participants with low I.P. group, Trust and Concern over climate change have no significant correlation. 

Discussion 

There were two aims for the study: First, to examine if the source of perceived  self-interest influences trust in the message and whether it significantly differs between individuals high in I.P. and low in I.P. Second, to assess if there is an association linking trust in the message and the general concern about climate change; and whether it significantly differs between individuals high in I.P. and low in I.P. The findings indicated that the perceived self-interest does not impact the trust of the messenger. However, this effect significantly differs among individuals with high I.P. This study is in line with Pornpitakpan (2004), who established that perceived self-interest does not impact the messenger's trust. The correlation analysis indicated a significant negative association linking the general concern about climate change and the high I.P. message's trust. This finding is in line with Petty, Fleming, Priester & Feinsteing (2001) that general concern about climate change negatively correlated with the message's trust.  

Future studies should be done on the effect of the credibility of the message source on persuasion. In conclusion, there is an insignificant difference in the source of perceived self-interest and trust in the message. However, people with high I.P. are more likely to differ with on perceived self-interest and the basis of trust in the message. Further, trust and concern over climate change have a negative relationship. 

References 

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Malka, A., Krosnick, J.A., & Langer, G. (2009) The association of knowledge with concern about global warming: trusted information sources shape public thinking. Risk Analysis, 29, 633–647. 

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Petty, R.E., Fleming, M.A., Priester, J.R., & Feinsteing, A.H. (2001) Individual versus group interest violation: surprise as a determinant of argument scrutiny and persuasion. Social Cognition, 19, 418-442. 

Pornpitakpan, C. (2004). The persuasiveness of source credibility: A critical review of five decades’ evidence. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 34, 243–281. 

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Hovland, C. I., & Weiss, W. (1951). The influence of source credibility on communication effectiveness. Public Opinion Quarterly, 15, 635–650. https://doi.org/10.1086/266350 

Yu, T., & Yu, T. (2017). The Moderating Effects of Students’ Personality Traits on ProEnvironmental Behavioral Intentions in Response to Climate Change. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 14, 1472. 

Whitmarsh (2011). Scepticism and uncertainty about climate change: Dimensions, determinants and change over time. Global Environmental Change, 21, 690-700.