Impacts of Media Frames and Values on Climate Change Perceptions

Two exploratory studies look at the effects of print news story framing on perceptions of climate change. In the first study, subjects were asked about their willingness to adopt changes in transportation choices and alternative energy use when confronted with climate change considerations. Manipulated variables included measures for self-efficacy, distributional justice, and community norms. Early analysis shows interaction effects between self-efficacy and distributional justice frames and between community norms and justice frames, suggesting that the introduction of justice issues changes audience perceptions in interesting ways. In the second study, we compare video versions of similar news stories to the original print versions for transportation issues, and also test a video version of a climate-related water conservation story for comparison.