Download - Metro pres lertzman
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Between dire and hopeful: community outreach,
communications and climate
Renee Lertzman, Ph.D.Fellow, Portland Center for Public HumanitiesPortland State [email protected]
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Interrupting the cycle
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Where we’re at…
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psychology of climate change communications
• Focuses primarily on cognition, information processing and rational processes
• Emphasis on proximity, abstraction and immediacy
• Using a “barriers” to engagement framework
• Focuses centrally on values and the so-called “attitude-behavior gap”
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Reframing: from barriers to opportunities
• Emotions as central for how we respond to climate change issues (Norgaard, 2011)
• Unconscious dimensions such as anxiety, fear, hope and loss (Randall, 2009)
• Necessity for creative engagement and participation (participatory processes)
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Research study: The Great Lakes and Green Bay
• Chose a field site ecologically troubled, industrial
• Interviewed ten participants in “not engaged” range
• Conducted interviews using psychosocial methods
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Research study: The Great Lakes and Green Bay
• Chose a field site ecologically troubled, industrial
• Interviewed ten participants in “not engaged” range
• Conducted interviews using psychosocial methods
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inspiration and context
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living the Great Lakes
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Desires, dilemmas, hopes, fears
• In-depth interviews
• Accounting for contradiction, dilemmas
• Attention to emotions and affect
• Exploring relations between information and actions
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What I found
• Strong narratives of concern and care • Ambivalence regarding action and
involvement• Pride and honor of place (industry)• Sadness and dismay, despair of degradation• Self-opting out of action (identity,
ambivalence)• Contradicting desires and fears
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Howard, 69, Green Bay native
• Deep love of nature, water, environment
• Strong stewardship
• Father’s accident with the paper mill
• Attachment to “Paddle to the Sea”
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So what does this mean for us?
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The importance of emotional (irrational) dimensions
Most social behavior from SUV ownership to frequent flying, far from being a simple response to inducements or threats, is mediated by meanings, narratives, identities and feelings.
As communicators and engagement professionals we need to build this into our work.
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communications that allow for:
- Coexistence of conflicting desires and aspirations
- Addressing potential anxieties at the get-go
- Anticipating potential fears and loss
- Focusing on solutions and strategies in context of the above
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Rethinking ‘engagement’
• Investing resources for exploring concern, fears, hopes, etc.
• Meeting people where they are • Development of tools to encourage creative
investment• Accommodation for difficult or reactive
responses (to climate-related initiatives)• Focus on concern, rather that it’s absence
(‘apathy’ or ‘barriers’)
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How effective are our communications?
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