🚨 Now published! 💡Do persuasive messages convince more people, or do they convince people to a larger degree? This is a question of breadth versus depth. We examine this question with 14 unique experiments, 94 messages tested, and 41,265 participants. Paper: doi.org/10.1016/j.je... 🧵1/x

🚨 New paper now out in Nature Climate Change! 🎉 Climate change belief systems across 110 countries and territories. Climate change beliefs don’t stand in isolation, they’re connected to one another in a belief system. 1/x

Nuclear NIMBYs: Our new national poll finds that Americans' support for building new nuclear power outnumbers opposition IF it is built in a state where they do not live, BUT the pattern is reversed if it would be located within 50 miles of their home.

🚨BREAKING: Apparently, we've written a paper about how dog ownership causes extreme weather 🐶🌪️ 😂 Or at least that’s what some 'news' headlines are suggesting in the US... While I appreciate the media's interest in our recent study in PNAS Nexus, in reality, we found something very different...

Are #AutonomousVehicles safer than human drivers? While the actual safety metrics matter a lot, another important determinant of diffusion and adoption is public perception of which one is safer. Our recent national study found that Americans are still about equally split on this.

It's going to be an uphill climb for autonomous vehicles. In AAA's survey, only only 13% of U.S. drivers say a fully self-driving vehicle is important to them, where as 64% of want automatic emergency braking, and 59% want lane-keeping assistance. newsroom.aaa.com/2025/02/aaa-...

Q: When is a large number of people feeling merely "Neutral" actually a positive signal? A: When this means there's very little opposition! In our national poll, we found that 51% of Americans who have *never* owned crypto said they feel neither positive nor negative sentiment... just neutral.

Are younger Americans more likely to own crypto? The data says YES... but with an asterisk. Typically with new tech, you'd expect younger people are more likely to participate. But in our national study, we see that ownership drops dramatically among adults under 25, despite peaking in ages 25-34.

🧠🌍 Can you correct misperceptions of the impact of different climate actions? In a new @pnasnexus.org paper, we tested whether climate action literacy interventions can shift behavioral commitments toward more effective climate actions. Check out our neat results 🙂 academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ad...

I agree so strongly with this!! I have had the good fortune to have several brilliant non-tenure track scientists in my research group, and have massively benefited as a result. This should be the norm!

💡 Interesting new paper uses semantic similarity to examine the "echo" of strategic comms by environmental orgs. Key findings: ▪️ More than 50% of comms had no "echo" at all ▪️ Online discourse showing strong similarity to the original comms is represented by a very small % of the total

A common challenge in communicating about climate data is that differences can seem small or noisy on the graph but are actually hugely consequential. An interesting new paper shows that making it binary (e.g., lake froze vs. did not freeze) can increase the perceived climate impacts.

✍ New working paper! How does message repetition and timing affect the durability of climate message effects? To examine this Q, we conducted a five-wave panel study, tracking people's beliefs over the course of 10 weeks in response to listening to @climateconnections.bsky.social radio stories. 1/x

🔎 Want to explore 16-years worth of data on climate change public opinion? The latest update to the Climate Change in the American Mind interactive data explorer was released today. Check it out! 👇

🧠 The term "psychedelics" can evoke strong mental models—both positive and negative—that shape public opinion and support for policy. As we continue efforts to decriminalize and secure therapeutic access, it's 🔑 that we understand these underlying perceptions. 1/x

🌎 Want to explore climate change public opinion in any of 187 countries and territories worldwide? New tool released today 👇

🤔 When thinking about strategy, one of the most common points of confusion is the difference between a strategy and a plan. A plan has a clear path: Do X, then Y, then Z. Strategy usually contains a *hypothesis about how the world works.* It’s a bet that accepts the possibility of being wrong.

New report from Pew Research Center: How the U.S. Public and AI Experts View Artificial Intelligence Some highlights that stood out to me: 🟣US adults and AI experts are similarly worried gov’t regulation won’t go far enough (rather than going too far) 1/x

What’s the ROI of message testing? When I think about this question, I keep coming back to this super important paper and its findings: 💡The more variable message effects are, the more valuable it is to test your messages in a research setting before deployment. 🧵 1/x

📝 What affects the durability of persuasion? In our new working paper, through a five wave panel study over ten weeks, we evaluate the impact of two factors: how many times individuals are treated (dosage) and the interval between treatments (timing). 1/x

💡 It’s amazing how broadly we can apply our understanding of diffusion-of-innovations. Even *the internet* took decades to become mainstream. A lot of the working components were starting to come together in the late 1960s and through the 1970s. But lots of people didn’t easily see the value. 🧵 1/x

A really cool new study on the impact of climate activism has just dropped! Some highlights: 1) "There is strong evidence that climate activism shifts public opinion and media coverage in a pro-climate direction, but this varies by context and the tactics employed."

🤖 A recent nationally representative survey by Gallup shows clearly that: 99% of respondents reported using products that include an AI component (e.g., virtual assistant, streaming services, etc.) but most people don't consider this to *be* AI. 1/2

🪧 What are the impacts of climate activism? We reviewed 50 studies from the past few years on this exact question, and here's what we found: 1/x

NEW ARTICLE: “Understanding the policy features that affect Indians' support for India's 2070 net-zero goal” in the journal Climatic Change. Find it here:

New update to our Global Warming's Six Americas numbers: Over the past decade, the percentage of people in the US identified as Alarmed about climate change has increased 11 pts (15%-->26%).

When thinking about strategic comms, I find that often there's an overemphasis on "effect" questions (use of the right words, frames, etc.) and less on "reach" questions (who to prioritize) or "durability" questions (how long does the effect last / resist competing influences). 🧵 1/x

Here's a great source I often reference during the peer-review process, and bonus points that the main finding is fully captured in the title: No Evidence that Measuring Moderators Alters Treatment Effects Paper: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

📢 New paper! What are the policy features that affect Indians' support for India's 2070 net-zero emissions goal? We address this question using a conjoint experiment in which we randomized several different policy features that could be prioritized in a given policy package. 1/x

Studies consistently show that Americans underestimate support for a wide range of pro-climate policies--an important intervention point. But another layer to this is that they also *over*estimate support for pro-fossil fuel policies. Check out the figure below for 18 diff policies we asked about:

🎉 The latest update of the Yale Climate Opinion Maps is now out! A hugely important tool for understanding climate public opinion around the US at state and local levels. Check it out here: climatecommunication.yale.edu/visualizatio...

Wonderful time visiting the UC Center for Public Engagement with Science for a talk and Q&A: Changing How People Think and Act on Climate Change There's also some great video footage of the whole thing, check it out here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=12Vj... ❤️ to @gustafson.bsky.social for inviting me

👇 New report! Main takeaway is well-summarized in the announcement: "Overall, we find Americans have become increasingly aware of the health harms of global warming, and many understand that certain groups of Americans are more vulnerable to these harms than others."

Will you be at the Eastern Psychological Association conference in NYC next week? One week from today, I'll be giving the social psychology keynote: “Building public and political will to address climate change” Come say hi!

When presenting research on the persuasive effects of diff messages, a common question is whether the effects generalize to other ppl/populations. An important question, but a question that I think is very under-appreciated is whether the effects generalize to other *messages like this one*. 1/x

An important consideration when thinking about whether past behavior predicts intended future behavior: people's interpretation of their past behavior. For example... 1/x

🤩 Out today! India Climate Opinion Factsheets Want to know what Indians think about climate change at subnational levels? Choose a state and a district, select the questions you want, and hit the button "generate factsheet" Check out the tool here: climatecommunication.yale.edu/visualizatio...

We have some work to do on public education about crypto. Our new national survey in partnership with The Digital Chamber shows that most Americans are unable to identify any specific benefits or risks of crypto.

What's preventing progress on psychedelics? We find that a very large portion of Americans (mistakenly) think they are addictive. When we look at support for decrim, we find that ppl who think psychedelics are addictive are very unlikely to support decrim. A significant barrier to progress. 1/2

Does moralizing messaging about renewable energy increase how durable message effects are? 🚨 Our new paper is now out: Testing the Durability of Persuasion From Moral Appeals About Renewable Energy A growing literature suggests that framing issues in moral terms can make attitudes more durable. 1/x

Much of the conversation around broadening access to psychedelic medicines involves getting better care options for veterans. Because so much of the policy conversation happens at the state level, it made me think, which US states have the most veterans? (Maps below!) 🧵 1/x

hello world! We've had an exciting few years working with private clients. As we launch our public work, our social accounts will distribute data and strategy to help further our mission: --> accelerating diffusion of the world's most important new ideas and innovations.

It has been brutally cold out here in the northeastern US. In these times, a small subgroup of the population will ask "what happened to global warming?" This confuses the difference between weather and climate. 1/2

Great information already and not surprising, as people want to be genuinely seen and not caricatured: “tailoring can be stronger when it is focused on factors that have more precise personal relevance, are unique to the target audience, and have a strong and direct connection to the outcome.”

📢 New paper! Why Tailoring Environmental Messages Has Mixed Persuasive Benefits One of the most common pieces of advice in env comms is to tailor your message to your audience: match message characteristics (e.g., framing) to audience characteristics (e.g., values) to enhance message effects. 🧵1/x

🤔 Reflections on spending the last week using OpenAI’s Deep Research. I had it work on questions where I am an expert, so I have a good view into how it’s doing. I also tested it with questions that are adjacent and far-removed from what I study. 🧵 1/x

❤️ A little research appropriate for Valentine's day: We surveyed both partners in 758 romantic couples about their climate change beliefs/behavior and found that there was about 30-40% correspondence of climate beliefs/behavior, leaving a lot of room for discussion. 🧵 1/4

Over the past couple months, sometimes it feels like there's this anti-climate wave happening, but that's not what we find in our data. Public opinion in the US has remained quite steady (see attached figures). ✍ Our new report out today: climatecommunication.yale.edu/publications...

🟦 🟥 A massive amount of research has focused on the effect of political "party cues," where people move their position on issues to be more in line with the position expressed by their preferred party. It might seem like this type of effect would be fleeting, but it's not. 🧵 1/3