User:Layne4/Media coverage of climate change

History
Media attention is especially high in carbon dependent countries with commitments under the Kyoto Protocol. The way the media report on climate change in English-speaking countries, especially in the United States, has been widely studied, while studies of reporting in other countries have been less expansive. A number of studies have shown that particularly in the United States and in the UK tabloid press, the media significantly understated the strength of scientific consensus on climate change established in IPCC Assessment Reports in 1995 and in 2001.

A peak in media coverage occurred in early 2007, driven by the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report and Al Gore's documentary An Inconvenient Truth. A subsequent peak in late 2009, which was 50% higher, may have been driven by a combination of the November 2009 Climatic Research Unit email controversy and December 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference.

The Media and Climate Change Observatory team at the University of Colorado Boulder found that 2017 “saw media attention to climate change and global warming ebb and flow” with June seeing the maximum global media coverage on both subjects. This rise is “largely attributed to news surrounding United States (US) President Donald J. Trump’s withdrawal from the 2015 United Nations (UN) Paris Climate Agreement, with continuing media attention paid to the emergent US isolation following through the G7 summit a few weeks later.”

Media coverage of climate change during the Trump Administration remained prominent as most news outlets placed heavy emphasis on Trump-related stories rather than climate-related events. This shift in media focus is referred to as “Trump Dump” and was shown to peak in times when the President was most active on Twitter. Just in the year 2017, the word “Trump” was mentioned 19,187 times in stories covered by five of the nation’s biggest press accounts, with “climate” being the second most frequent word.

Alarmism
Alarmism is using inflated language, including an urgent tone and imagery of doom. In a report produced for the Institute for Public Policy Research Gill Ereaut and Nat Segnit suggested that alarmist language is frequently used in relation to environmental matters by newspapers, popular magazines and in campaign literature put out by the government and environment groups. It is claimed that when applied to climate change, alarmist language can create a greater sense of urgency.

The term alarmist can be used as a pejorative by critics of mainstream climate science to describe those that endorse it. MIT meteorologist Kerry Emanuel wrote that labeling someone as an "alarmist" is "a particularly infantile smear considering what is at stake." He continued that using this "inflammatory terminology has a distinctly Orwellian flavor."

It has been argued that using sensational and alarming techniques, often evoke "denial, paralysis, or apathy" rather than motivating individuals to action and do not motivate people to become engaged with the issue of climate change. In the context of climate refugees—the potential for climate change to displace people—it has been reported that "alarmist hyperbole" is frequently employed by private military contractors and think tanks.

Some media reports have used alarmist tactics to challenge the science related to global warming by comparing it with a purported episode of global cooling. In the 1970s, global cooling, a claim with limited scientific support (even during the height of a media frenzy over global cooling, "the possibility of anthropogenic warming dominated the peer-reviewed literature" ) was widely reported in the press. Several media pieces have claimed that since the even-at-the-time-poorly-supported theory of global cooling was shown to be false, that the well-supported theory of global warming can also be dismissed. For example, an article in The Hindu by Kapista and Bashkirtsev wrote: "Who remembers today, they query, that in the 1970s, when global temperatures began to dip, many warned that we faced a new ice age? An editorial in The Time magazine on June 24, 1974, quoted concerned scientists as voicing alarm over the atmosphere 'growing gradually cooler for the past three decades', 'the unexpected persistence and thickness of pack ice in the waters around Iceland,' and other harbingers of an ice age that could prove 'catastrophic.' Man was blamed for global cooling as he is blamed today for global warming"., and the Irish Independent published an article claiming that "The widespread alarm over global warming is only the latest scare about the environment to come our way since the 1960s. Let's go through some of them. Almost exactly 30 years ago the world was in another panic about climate change. However, it wasn't the thought of global warming that concerned us. It was the fear of its opposite, global cooling. The doom-sayers were wrong in the past and it's entirely possible they're wrong this time as well." Numerous other examples exist.

Another example of climate alarmism that regularly makes headlines is the threat of crop failure and widespread famine caused by climate change. These claims are regularly reported in the press even as they are contradicted by most available scientific evidence. For example, an article in Rolling Stone titled “Climate Crisis: 11 Foods Already Being Impacted by Climate Change” raise alarm in the readers by claiming that climate change will soon cause many crops to fail, causing starvation and malnutrition across the globe. One article from the Cornell Allience for Science claims that there are many farmers and ranches in southern Africa that a desperate for new technologies to combat failing crops. This article states that climate change is “driving millions into hunger.” These claims can be disputed by data from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) that crop production in Africa could “reach multi-year highs” as many food crops are being produced substantially and steadily across the continent.

Discourses of action
Commentators have argued that the climate change discourses constructed in the media have not been conducive to generating the political will for swift action. The polar bear has become a powerful discursive symbol in the fight against climate change. However, such images may create a perception of climate change impacts as geographically distant, and MacNaghten argues that climate change needs to be framed as an issue 'closer to home'. On the other hand, Beck suggests that a major benefit of global media is that it brings distant issues within our consciousness.

Furthermore, media coverage of climate change (particularly in tabloid journalism but also more generally), is concentrated around extreme weather events and projections of catastrophe, creating “a language of imminent terror” which some commentators argue has instilled policy-paralysis and inhibited response. Moser et al. suggest using solution-orientated frames will help inspire action to solve climate change. The predominance of catastrophe frames over solution frames may help explain the apparent value-action gap with climate change; the current discursive setting has generated concern over climate change but not inspired action.

Breaking the prevailing notions in society requires discourse that is traditionally appropriate and approachable to common people. For example, Bill McKibben, an environmental activist, provides one approach to inspiring action: a war-like mobilization, where climate change is the enemy. This approach would resonate with working Americans who normally find themselves occupied with other news headlines. Dispelling the capitalist commodification of the environment also requires different rhetoric that breaks certain ingrained notions concerning the human relationship with the environment. This could include incorporating traditional Indigenous knowledge that prioritizes human existence with the environment as a mutualistic and protective one.

Additionally, international movements in developing countries in the Global South are usually excluded in developed nations that assert hegemony over the economies of developing nations. This especially applies to the people of Latin America, that are battling multinational oil and mineral corporations that seek to cooperate with the ruling class and exploit fragile ecosystems, rather than provide real solutions to working people that mutually benefit the environment. This is apparent in Ecuador, where former President Rafael Correa, a left-leaning populist, incited “economic growth” as a reason to sell portions of the Amazon rainforest to oil companies. These popular movements usually are neglected by the United States due to corporate relationships within the political sphere of influence.

Compared to what experts know about traditional media's and tabloid journalism's impacts on the formation of public perceptions of climate change and willingness to act, there is comparatively little knowledge of the impacts of social media, including message platforms like Twitter, on public attitudes toward climate change.

In recent years, there has been an increase in the influence and role that social media plays in conveying opinions and knowledge through information sharing. There are several emerging studies that explore the connection between social media and the public’s awareness of climate change. Anderson found that there is evidence that social media can raise awareness of climate change issues, but warns that it can also lead to opinion-dominated ideologies and reinforcement. Another study examined datasets from Twitter to assess the ideas and attitudes that users of the application held toward climate change. Williams et al. found that users tend to be active in groups that share the same opinions, often at the extremes of the spectrum, resulting in less polarized opinions between the groups. These studies show that social media can have both a negative and positive impact on the information sharing of issues related to climate change.

United States
One of the first critical studies of media coverage of climate change in the United States appeared in 1999. The author summarized her research: "Following a review of the decisive role of the media in American politics and of a few earlier studies of media bias, this paper examines media coverage of the greenhouse effect. It does so by comparing two pictures. The first picture emerges from reading all 100 greenhouse-related articles published over a five-month period (May–September 1997) in The Christian Science Monitor, New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The Washington Post. The second picture emerges from the mainstream scientific literature. This comparison shows that media coverage of environmental issues suffers from both shallowness and pro-corporate bias."According to Peter J. Jacques et al., the mainstream news media of the United States is an example of the effectiveness of environmental skepticism as a tactic. A 2005 study reviewed and analyzed the US mass-media coverage of the environmental issue of climate change from 1988 to 2004. The authors confirm that within the journalism industry there is great emphasis on eliminating the presence of media bias. In their study they found that — due to this practice of journalistic objectivity — "Over a 15-year period, a majority (52.7%) of prestige-press articles featured balanced accounts that gave 'roughly equal attention' to the views that humans were contributing to global warming and that exclusively natural fluctuations could explain the earth's temperature increase." As a result, they observed that it is easier for people to conclude that the issue of global warming and the accompanying scientific evidence is still hotly debated.

A study of US newspapers and television news from 1995 to 2006 examined "how and why US media have represented conflict and contentions, despite an emergent consensus view regarding anthropogenic climate science." The IPCC Assessment Reports in 1995 and in 2001 established an increasingly strong scientific consensus, yet the media continued to present the science as contentious. The study noted the influence of Michael Crichton's 2004 novel State of Fear, which "empowered movements across scale, from individual perceptions to the perspectives of US federal powerbrokers regarding human contribution to climate change."

A 2010 study concluded that "Mass media in the U.S. continue to suggest that scientific consensus estimates of global climate disruption, such as those from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), are 'exaggerated' and overly pessimistic. By contrast, work on the Asymmetry of Scientific Challenge (ASC) suggests that such consensus assessments are likely to understate climate disruptions [...] new scientific findings were more than twenty times as likely to support the ASC perspective than the usual framing of the issue in the U.S. mass media. The findings indicate that supposed challenges to the scientific consensus on global warming need to be subjected to greater scrutiny, as well as showing that, if reporters wish to discuss "both sides" of the climate issue, the scientifically legitimate 'other side' is that, if anything, global climate disruption may prove to be significantly worse than has been suggested in scientific consensus estimates to date."

The most watched news network in the United States, Fox News, most of the time promotes climate misinformation and employs tactics that distract from the urgency of global climate change, according to a 2019 study by Public Citizen. According to the study, 86% of Fox News segments that discussed the topic were "dismissive of the climate crisis, cast its consequences in doubt or employed fear mongering when discussing climate solutions." These segments presented global climate change as a political construct, rarely, if ever, discussing the threat posed by climate change or the vast body of scientific evidence for its existence. Consistent with such politicized framing, three messages were most commonly advanced in these segments: global climate change is part of a "big government" agenda of the Democratic Party (34% of segments); an effective response to the climate crisis would destroy the economy and hurtle us back to the Stone Age (26% of segments); and, concern about the climate crisis is “alarmists”, “hysterical,” the shrill voice of a "doomsday climate cult," or the like (12% of segments). Such segments often featured "experts" who are not climate scientists at all or are personally connected to vested interests, such as the energy industry and its network of lobbyists and think tanks, for example, the Heartland Institute, funded by the Exxon Mobil company and the  Koch foundation. The remaining segments (14%) were neutral on the subject or presented information without editorializing.

It has been suggested that the association of climate change with the Arctic in popular media may undermine effective communication of the scientific realities of anthropogenic climate change. The close association of images of Arctic glaciers, ice, and fauna with climate change might harbor cultural connotations that contradict the fragility of the region. For example, in cultural-historical narratives, the Arctic was depicted as an unconquerable, foreboding environment for explorers; in climate change discourse, the same environment is sought to be understood as fragile and easily affected by humanity.

Gallup's annual update on Americans' attitudes toward the environment shows a public that over the last two years, (2008-2010) has become less worried about the threat of global warming, less convinced that its effects are already happening, and more likely to believe that scientist themselves are uncertain about its occurrence. In response to one key question, 48% of Americans now believe that the seriousness of global warming is generally exaggerated, up from 41% in 2009 and 31% in 1997, when Gallup first asked the question. Data from the Media Matters for America organization has shown that, despite 2015 being “a year marked by more landmark actions to address climate change than ever before,” the combined climate coverage on the top broadcast networks was down by 5% from 2014.

President Donald Trump denies the threat of global warming publicly. As a result of the Trump Presidency, media coverage on climate change was expected to decline during his term as president. The decline in media coverage can be attributed to Trump’s downplay and withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement. There are limitations that hinder the media’s ability to report on climate change matters. These include advertising and editorial challenges, “false balance” between skeptics and scientists, the fossil fuel industry’s influence within public relations, and finally the overall decline of climate change coverage, termed “Climate Silence”. With this slow decline of coverage, the public perception and understanding of climate change could be distorted, in turn causing delayed policy reaction and implementation.

Globally, media coverage of global warming and climate change decreased in 2020. In the United States, however, newspaper coverage of climate change increased 29% between March 2020 and April 2020, these numbers are still 22% down from coverage in January 2020. This spike in April 2020 can be attributed to the increased coverage of the “Covering Climate Now'' campaign and the US holiday of “Earth Day”. The overall decline in climate change coverage in the year 2020 is related to the increased coverage and interconnectedness of COVID-19 and President Trump, without mention of climate change, that began in January 2020.

Coverage of youth
Published in the journal Childhood, the article "Children's protest in relation to the climate emergency: A qualitative study on a new form of resistance promoting political and social change" considers how children have evolved into prominent actors to create a global impact on awareness of climate change. It highlights the work of children like Greta Thunberg and the significance of their resistance to the passivity of world leaders regarding climate change. It also discusses how individual resistance can directly be linked to collective resistance and that this then creates a more powerful impact, empowering young people to act more responsibly and take authority over the future. The article offers a holistic view of the impact of youth to raise awareness whilst also inspiring action, and using social media platforms such as TikTok, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram to share the youth message.

Australia
Australia has recently experienced some of the most intense bushfire seasons in its immediate history. This phenomenon has sparked extensive media coverage both nationally and internationally. Much of the media coverage of the 2019 and 2020 Australian bushfire seasons has discussed the different factors that lead to and increase the chances of extreme fire seasons. A climate scientist, Nerilie Abram, at Australian National University explained in an article for Scientific American, that the four major conditions need to exist for wildfire and those include “available fuel, dryness of that fuel, weather conditions that aid the rapid spread of fire and an ignition. She then explained that climate change aids the spread and frequency of Australian fires because of the effect it has on dryness of fuels and fire weather patterns.

Although as there has been increased media attention to climate change after these extreme fire seasons, Australian news outlets have been reported to present misleading claims and information. One article from The Australian in 2009 claimed that climate change and global warming were fraudulent claims pushed by so-called “warmaholics”. Many other examples of claims that dismiss climate change have been posted by media outlets in Australia throughout the years following as well. As the world entered into 2020, global media media coverage of climate change issues decreased and COVID-19 coverage increased. This was also experienced by Australia with a 34% decrease in climate change articles published from March of 2020.