Research Statement

I am a geographer trained in the cognitive and social psychology of risk perception and decision making. My research is strongly interdisciplinary and seeks to understand the psychological, cultural, political, and geographic factors that shape human environmental perception, decision making and behavior. My current research is focused on three broad themes:

(1) Global Climate Change

Global climate change is a prototypical member of a new class of risks that have global causes and impacts. The impacts of this “global” risk, however, will occur in different ways in different places at different points in time (e.g., sea level rise vs. drought vs. water-borne disease). My research examines how human decision makers (individuals, groups and entire societies) perceive climate change risks, what mitigation and adaptation policies they support or oppose, and what actions they have or are willing to take to address this risk. Recent projects include:

a) Climate Change in the American Mind
Several national surveys on American risk perceptions, policy preferences and behaviors regarding global climate change.

b) The Future is Now: Climate Change Detection, Attribution and Adaptation in Alaska
Alaska (and the rest of the Arctic) has warmed approximately twice the global average. As a result, Alaska is already experiencing significant climate impacts. This project examines how Alaskans are responding.

c) Climate Change, Vicarious Experience and the Social Amplification of Risk
On Memorial Day 2004, Twentieth Century Fox released The Day After Tomorrow, a disaster movie depicting an abrupt climate change leading to a new ice age, triggered by a shutdown of the North Atlantic thermohaline circulation system. The Day After Tomorrow was the first movie to depict an abrupt climate change for a worldwide audience and sparked a heated debate about climate change science and politics. This study examined whether the film significantly influenced American climate change risk perceptions, policy preferences and behavioral intentions.

d) Scientific Information vs. Vicarious Experience in Climate Change Risk Perception and Behavior: An International Study
An experimental study of different modes of climate change communication replicated in Argentina, Brazil, England, Germany, Japan, Mexico and the United States.

(2) Sustainability Values, Attitudes and Behaviors

Most advocates of sustainable development recognize the need for changes in human values, attitudes and behaviors in order to achieve a sustainability transition that will meet human needs and reduce hunger and poverty, while maintaining the life support systems of the planet (National Research Council, 1999). But which values, attitudes and behaviors are crucial to sustainability? What are the current state and trajectories of these values around the world? Does the global public support sustainable development? What are global public attitudes towards economic growth, human development, environmental protection, population growth, affluence, and science and technology? What does the global public think about contextual values, like political freedom, democracy, equality, capitalism, globalization, trust in institutions and social change? Finally, what barriers prevent values and attitudes from being translated into action?

This project assesses the current state of global sustainability values, attitudes and behaviors and begins to answer these questions, drawing upon both official declarations (e.g., the Brundtland Conference, UN Millennium Goals Project, U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Earth Charter, etc.) and empirical data from numerous multi-national and quasi-global scale surveys.

(3) Interpretive Communities of Risk

Risks and risk management occur within a rich and complex socio-cultural context, in which particular groups are predisposed to select, ignore and interpret risk information in different ways. This project is part of a broad program to understand the socio-cultural dynamics of risk perception, decision-making and behavior. Specifically, this project integrates three recent research trajectories (affective imagery, cultural theory, and the “white male effect”) in a systematic effort to identify, describe and explain the existence of discrete “interpretive communities of risk:” groups who share common risk perceptions, affective imagery, cultural worldviews, and sociodemographic characteristics. Results from this study will contribute to emerging theory on the roles of affect, symbolic meaning, cultural worldviews and socio-cultural context in risk perception and decision-making.