Climate Change Denial
Three aspects of climate change denial will be discussed: the psychology of denial, the beliefs of political elites, and climate misinformation. The section on psychology cites a 2020 paper about motivated denial – knowing the facts but denying them – and briefly refers to information processing and the links between emotion and cognition in two later papers. The section on political elites is based on a 2026 survey of elected officials, staffers, regulators, lobbyists, and policy professionals in the United States. The final section cites two recent papers, one on the spread and persistence of climate misinformation, the other predicting its future development.
Psychology of denial
“Action on climate change is currently minimal, and woefully
inadequate for steering away from the worst trajectories and impacts.” These
were the opening words of a 2020 paper entitled Understanding and Countering
the Motivated Roots of Climate Change Denial. By motivated denial, the
authors meant “knowing or having access to the facts, but nevertheless denying
them.” They attempted to understand motivated climate change denial from a
psychological perspective, and an outline of their findings follows (Wong-Parodi
and Feygina, 2020). The psychological processes underlying motivated climate
change denial were largely based on examples and research in the United States “whose
population is exceptionally high on climate denial and disengagement”. The psychological
processes are grouped under four headings System justification, Identity,
Social norms and Self-affirmation.
System justification
This category refers to “the need to protect and uphold
existing socioeconomic systems and institutions” in the face of threats to the
status-quo. Existing social arrangements are seen as providing “safety,
security, stability, meaning, and relatedness”, resulting in resistance to
change and innovation. Climate change threatens most of the fundamental
components of the existing system, as it “makes clear how our economic
structures and industrial practices are unsustainable in the long run; how
ideologies of progress and technology are mistaken or insufficient to ensure
the health and longevity of civilization; and, how the shortcoming of existing
political systems are endangering our collective well-being.” One response to
this threat is to deny the reality of climate change.
Identity
“Climate change has become a highly polarized ideological
issue across industrialized wealthy countries”. Broadly, in the United States those
aligned with Democratic and liberal identities acknowledge climate change,
while those with Republican and conservative identities do not. Opinions can be
based not on facts or information, “but on the need to affiliate with and be
accepted by groups they identify with”. Importantly, people have other strong
group affiliations and identities based on their gender, race, ethnicity, and
other social affiliations, as well as a personal sense of identity with the
environment, which contribute to attitudes toward climate change. These
identities can also be powerful drivers of connection, concern, and engagement.
Differences in moral values and cultural meanings are also important. For liberals
care and fairness rank highly, while conservatives “are also driven by values
of loyalty, authority, and purity.” Engaging people with climate change “is
unlikely to succeed without awareness of underlying identity drivers of denial
and engagement.”
Social norms
There can be a “need to align with the norms and standards
of the groups one belongs to.” These rules or principles define what is “required,
permissible, or forbidden” in the group and “powerfully influence perceptions,
attitudes, and behaviours” towards climate change. Aligning behaviour towards
the group norms avoids “social judgments or marginalization”.
Self-affirmation
Climate change can threaten one’s sense of personal
integrity –seeing oneself as “capable, consistent, and adhering to strong moral
and ethical principles”. People wish to maintain a positive view of themselves,
and “respond defensively to stressful or threatening events” that challenge
their sense of adequacy and worth. “Acknowledging climate change requires
individuals to critically examine their contribution to the problem,
potentially calling into question their integrity, and prompting self-defensive
reactions.”
The authors go on to discuss ways of “fostering engagement
with climate change among diverse audiences” including sceptics, noting that
psychological theories offer “insight into dynamics that underlie denial” and
suggest ways to address them.
More recent publications expand on some of the above topics
and suggest other approaches to the psychology of climate change denial.
Ebrahimi (2026) claims that while climate denial is often misunderstood as
ignorance, “evidence from neuroscience reveals it as identity protection.” From
this viewpoint, “resistance to climate action reflects how people process
information, not how much they know” and this resistance “often functions as a
psychological defence”. To succeed, communication of climate science needs to “engage
not only minds, but also hearts and identities, rebuild trust, and catalyse the
collective agency needed for a sustainable future.”
Davidson et al. (2026) discuss the links between emotion and
cognition governing public behaviour in response to climate change. Recognising
that “we are exposed to far more information than we can process” it has been
suggested that attention to certain signals is initiated by emotions that
identify those signals as needing further attention. The authors propose a conceptual
model of the emotion-cognition path with three stages: first the individual is
exposed to information about climate change, derived from media, education, and
social contact; if the information triggers an emotional response this leads to
cognitive attention, otherwise it is dismissed; emotionally triggered attention
can then lead to a course of action, or a decision not to act.
Political Elites
Furnas, LaPira and Benegal (2026) point to the need for
political elites to share a basic set of facts about climate science. In their
survey of elected officials, staffers, regulators, lobbyists, and policy
professionals in the United States, they found “near-unanimous agreement among
the Democratic elite” on the reality of global warming, while “substantial minorities
of Republican elites” rejected the scientific evidence. Their analysis of data
indicated that “partisan identity explains far more variation in elite climate
beliefs than ideology, trust in science, or broader conspiratorial
predispositions.”
Questions about global warming and the effect of human
activity were put to Democratic and Republican elites and to members of the
public.
99.6% of Democratic elites believed that global warming was
happening, as opposed to 80.4% of Republican elites.
96.6% of Democratic elites believed that human activity was
the primary cause, as opposed to 44.9% of Republican elites.
93.9% of Democratic members of the public believed that
global warming was happening, as opposed to 78.7% of Republican members of the
public.
72.2% of Democratic members of the public believed that
human activity was the primary cause, as opposed to 22.2% of Republican members
of the public.
The authors suggest that “elite climate beliefs may be
better understood as products of group identity than of coherent policy reasoning.”
They also note that the elites in their sample work in environments where “sustained
exposure to co-partisan framing is a feature of daily work life” and suggest
that “partisan identity among elites may function not merely as a heuristic but
as a structuring force in belief formation”.
Climate misinformation
Vallström and Törnberg, 2025, note that despite “overwhelming
scientific consensus on human-caused climate change, the spread of climate
misinformation remains alarmingly persistent.” They cite climate denial
narratives amplified online by political influencers, often “using audio-based
digital storytelling through platforms like YouTube and podcasts.” Their study focusses
on a particular Swedish politician and prominent climate denialist, and aims to
advance the understanding of climate misinformation against a background of the
theory of social movements.
They found a variety of topics “ranging from outright
rejection of climate change to more subtle arguments that accept certain
scientific aspects but resist their implications or the urgency for action” and
connect them in three clusters to different forms of climate change denial. The
first cluster is “primarily characterized by epistemic skepticism, which casts
doubt on the scientific basis of climate change.” The second cluster is “largely
dominated by response skepticism, which questions the effectiveness and
appropriateness of actions to address climate change” and the third encompasses
“skepticism towards globalism, critiques of laws perceived as ‘globalistic,’
and alleged infringements on human freedoms.” Examples may be found in the
portrayal of climate science as lacking rigour, “leading to ‘meaningless’
research”; framing of climate issues as “politicized, with ‘alarmist’ actions
based on beliefs rather than facts” and injustice against dissenters, such as
the “labelling of critics as ‘climate deniers’” and media suppression.
Rice (2026) describes climate misinformation as one of the
most significant barriers to effective climate action in the 21st century, with
public discourse about the environment “mired in confusion, denial, and
strategic misinformation”. He refers to “the shift from outright denial” to
delay and deflection tactics, the role of artificial intelligence in “amplifying
misinformation spread”, and the political economy of climate misinformation.
His essay builds on the work of Yotam Ophir, who described the influence of
misinformation as “not uniform, with the impact tending to be higher on the
marginalized, those lacking political, social, economic, and cultural power” (Ophir,
2025). Misinformation is seen as a persistent and continuously adapting feature
of human communication. Climate misinformation can be traced back to tobacco
industry strategies designed to manufacture scientific controversy.
The “strategic production of ignorance” in the climate
domain has three main mechanisms: “selectively citing outlier studies,
amplifying scientific uncertainty, and elevating non-expert voices” in media
coverage. Rice claims that “climate misinformation has evolved beyond outright
denial”, citing examples that “acknowledge the reality of climate change but at
the same time, oppose meaningful action.” Such arguments may describe technological
solutions as unviable, arguing that we should do nothing and continue to use
fossil fuels. Narratives which contain elements of truth or appeal to legitimate
political and economic concerns “are more difficult to counter than outright
denial”.
Rice predicts that most climate misinformation may soon be AI-generated
“enabling the production of personalized false narratives at unprecedented
scale” with AI systems capable of rapidly generating “novel, fake, and
malicious variations of truthful content.” Generative AI can also help produce
“convincing yet entirely false scientific data - beyond simply news-based, or
entertainment-based content - including fabricated temperature data,
manipulated satellite imagery” and articles mimicking top scientific journals.
Climate misinformation will become “an increasingly potent
tool of geopolitical strategy” helping “justify non-cooperation with
international environmental and climate change-related agreements … framing
climate action as a direct threat to national sovereignty” and undermining
international economic competitiveness. In conclusion Rice states that “Every
day of delayed climate action locks in additional warming, increases adaptation
costs, and reduces the feasibility of limiting temperature rise to safe levels”
and that combating misinformation is not just about combatting false beliefs, but
about “pre-serving the epistemic foundations necessary for collective social
and political action on shared global challenges.”
References
Davidson, D. et al., 2026, Differentiating emotional
pathways to climate change (in)action: An empirical test, Research Square
(preprint), online, accessed 8 July 2026
Ebrahimi, E., 2026, Climate Change Denial as Identity
Defence: Understanding Resistance Beyond Ignorance, Environmental Management,
online, accessed 8 July 2026
https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00267-025-02353-5.pdf
Furnas, A., LaPira, T. and Benegal, S., 2026, Political
elites' partisan beliefs about climate change, Environmental Research, online,
accessed 11 July 2026
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2515-7620/ae56d7/pdf
Ophir, Y., 2025, Misinformation and society.
Wiley-Blackwell; 2025.
Rice, J., 2026, Beyond post-truth: Projecting the future
trajectory of climate misinformation, PLOS Climate, online, accessed 14 July
2026
https://journals.plos.org/climate/article?id=10.1371/journal.pclm.0000916
Vallström, V., Törnberg, A., 2025, From YouTube to
Parliament: the dual role of political influencers in shaping climate change
discourse, Environmental Sociology, online, accessed 15 July 2026
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/23251042.2025.2475519
Wong-Parodi, G., and Feygina, I., 2020, Understanding and
Countering the Motivated Roots of Climate Change Denial, Current Opinion in
Environmental Sustainability, online, accessed 10 July 2026
Comments
Post a Comment