IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/climat/v145y2017i3d10.1007_s10584-017-2112-z.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Politicization of science: how climate change skeptics use experts and scientific evidence in their online communication

Author

Listed:
  • Hannah Schmid-Petri

    (University of Passau)

Abstract

This study, using the discussion about climate change in the USA as an example, analyzes the research question of how climate change skeptics use experts and scientific evidence in their online communication. Two different strategies are distinguished: legitimation and criticism. The study conducts a quantitative content analysis of online documents to answer the research question. The results show that the deduced strategies are an important part of the communication of climate change skeptics, who more commonly use the criticism strategy than the legitimation strategy. Results are further differentiated for different actor types and various types of experts.

Suggested Citation

  • Hannah Schmid-Petri, 2017. "Politicization of science: how climate change skeptics use experts and scientific evidence in their online communication," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 523-537, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:145:y:2017:i:3:d:10.1007_s10584-017-2112-z
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-017-2112-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-017-2112-z
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10584-017-2112-z?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zürn, Michael, 2014. "The politicization of world politics and its effects: Eight propositions," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 6(1), pages 47-71.
    2. Robert Brulle, 2014. "Institutionalizing delay: foundation funding and the creation of U.S. climate change counter-movement organizations," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 122(4), pages 681-694, February.
    3. Debra Javeline & Gregory Shufeldt, 2014. "Scientific opinion in policymaking: the case of climate change adaptation," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 47(2), pages 121-139, June.
    4. Srdan Medimorec & Gordon Pennycook, 2015. "The language of denial: text analysis reveals differences in language use between climate change proponents and skeptics," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 133(4), pages 597-605, December.
    5. Stella Nordhagen & Dan Calverley & Chris Foulds & Laura O’Keefe & Xinfang Wang, 2014. "Climate change research and credibility: balancing tensions across professional, personal, and public domains," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 125(2), pages 149-162, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Swarnalakshmi Umamaheswaran & Vandita Dar & Jagadish Thaker, 2022. "The Evolution of Climate Change Reporting in Business Media: Longitudinal Analysis of a Business Newspaper," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(22), pages 1-21, November.
    2. Tschötschel, Robin, 2021. "Polarisation vs consensus-building: How US and German news media portray climate change as a feature of political identities," SocArXiv r5zdc, Center for Open Science.
    3. Drieschova, Alena, 2021. "The social media revolution and shifts in the climate change discourse," Global Cooperation Research Papers 29, University of Duisburg-Essen, Käte Hamburger Kolleg / Centre for Global Cooperation Research (KHK/GCR21).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jeremiah Bohr, 2017. "Is it hot in here or is it just me? Temperature anomalies and political polarization over global warming in the American public," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 142(1), pages 271-285, May.
    2. Mireille Chiroleu‐Assouline & Thomas P. Lyon, 2020. "Merchants of doubt: Corporate political action when NGO credibility is uncertain," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 439-461, April.
    3. Hamish van der Ven & Yixian Sun, 2021. "Varieties of Crises: Comparing the Politics of COVID-19 and Climate Change," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 21(1), pages 13-22, Winter.
    4. Oliver Lazarus & Sonali McDermid & Jennifer Jacquet, 2021. "The climate responsibilities of industrial meat and dairy producers," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 165(1), pages 1-21, March.
    5. Sam Crawley & Hilde Coffé & Ralph Chapman, 2022. "Climate Belief and Issue Salience: Comparing Two Dimensions of Public Opinion on Climate Change in the EU," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 162(1), pages 307-325, July.
    6. Wilde, Pieter de & Junk, Wiebke Marie & Palmtag, Tabea, 2016. "Accountability and opposition to globalization in international assemblies," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 22(4), pages 823-846.
    7. Saatvika Rai, 2020. "Policy Adoption and Policy Intensity: Emergence of Climate Adaptation Planning in U.S. States," Review of Policy Research, Policy Studies Organization, vol. 37(4), pages 444-463, July.
    8. Stephen Fox & Janne Kauttio & Yusuf Mubarak & Hannu Niemisto, 2017. "Determinants in Competition between Cross-Sector Alliances," Administrative Sciences, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-15, August.
    9. Caiwei Ma & Norman Au & Lianping Ren, 2020. "Biased minds experience improved decision-making speed and confidence on social media: a heuristic approach," Information Technology & Tourism, Springer, vol. 22(4), pages 593-624, December.
    10. Sugandha Srivastav & Ryan Rafaty, 2023. "Political Strategies to Overcome Climate Policy Obstructionism," Papers 2304.14960, arXiv.org.
    11. Jan Beyers & Marcel Hanegraaff, 2017. "Balancing friends and foes: Explaining advocacy styles at global diplomatic conferences," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 461-484, September.
    12. Joost Moor, 2022. "Prioritizing adaptation and mitigation in the climate movement: evidence from a cross-national protest survey of the Global Climate Strike, 2019," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 27(6), pages 1-19, August.
    13. Srivastav, Sugandha & Rafaty, Ryan, 2021. "Five Worlds of Political Strategy in the Climate Movement," INET Oxford Working Papers 2021-07, Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford.
    14. Viktor Szép, 2022. "Transnational Parliamentary Activities in EU Foreign Policy: The Role of Parliamentarians in the Establishment of the EU's Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(6), pages 1741-1757, November.
    15. Israel Nyaburi Nyadera & UÄŸur Yasin Asal & Billy Agwanda, 2021. "The Role of Regional Organisations in Economic Growth Among Developing Countries: A Case of the Af DB," India Quarterly: A Journal of International Affairs, , vol. 77(3), pages 384-403, September.
    16. Rebecca Bromley-Trujillo & James Stoutenborough & Arnold Vedlitz, 2015. "Scientific advocacy, environmental interest groups, and climate change: are climate skeptic portrayals of climate scientists as biased accurate?," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 133(4), pages 607-619, December.
    17. Dylan Bugden, 2022. "Denial and distrust: explaining the partisan climate gap," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 170(3), pages 1-23, February.
    18. Bes, Bart Joachim & Schoonvelde, Martijn & Rauh, Christian, 2020. "Undermining, defusing or defending European integration? Assessing public communication of European executives in times of EU politicisation," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 59(2), pages 397-423.
    19. Dirk De Bièvre & Arlo Poletti, 2020. "Towards Explaining Varying Degrees of Politicization of EU Trade Agreement Negotiations," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(1), pages 243-253.
    20. Caiwei Ma & Norman Au & Lianping Ren, 0. "Biased minds experience improved decision-making speed and confidence on social media: a heuristic approach," Information Technology & Tourism, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-32.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:145:y:2017:i:3:d:10.1007_s10584-017-2112-z. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.