Evaluating the usefulness of Protection Motivation Theory for predicting climate change mitigation behavioral intentions among a US sample of climate change deniers and acknowledgers.

ABSTRACT:

Background

This paper summarizes data from 7 studies that used Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) to guide climate messaging with the goal of increasing climate-mitigating behavioral intentions. Together, the studies address 5 research questions. 1) Does PMT predict behavioral intentions in the context of climate change mitigation? 2) Does PMT work similarly for climate change deniers vs acknowledgers? 3) Are the effects of threat and efficacy additive or multiplicative? 4) Does adding measures of collective threat and efficacy improve the model accuracy for a collective problem like climate change? 5) Can threat and efficacy appraisals - and ultimately behavioral intentions - be shifted through climate messaging?

Methods

Seven online experiments were conducted on US adults

SUBMITTER: Frantz CM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11523794 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature