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Beliefs about Climate Beliefs: The Importance of Second-Order Opinions for Climate Politics

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  • Mildenberger, Matto
  • Tingley, Dustin

Abstract

When political action entails individual costs but group-contingent benefits, political participation may depend on an individual’s perceptions of others’ beliefs; yet detailed empirical attention to these second-order beliefs – beliefs about the beliefs of others – remains rare. We offer the first comprehensive examination of the distribution and content of second-order climate beliefs in the United States and China, drawing from six new opinion surveys of mass publics, political elites and intellectual elites. We demonstrate that all classes of political actors have second-order beliefs characterized by egocentric bias and global underestimation of pro-climate positions. We then demonstrate experimentally that individual support for pro-climate policies increases after respondents update their second-order beliefs. We conclude that scholars should focus more closely on second-order beliefs as a key factor shaping climate policy inaction and that scholars can use the climate case to extend their understanding of second-order beliefs more broadly.

Suggested Citation

  • Mildenberger, Matto & Tingley, Dustin, 2019. "Beliefs about Climate Beliefs: The Importance of Second-Order Opinions for Climate Politics," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 49(4), pages 1279-1307, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:bjposi:v:49:y:2019:i:04:p:1279-1307_00
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    Cited by:

    1. Elisabeth Gsottbauer & Michael Kirchler & Christian König-Kersting, 2023. "Climate Crisis Attitudes among Financial Professionals and Climate Experts," Working Papers 2023-06, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    2. Monika Pompeo & Nina Serdarevic, 2021. "Is information enough? The case of Republicans and climate change," Discussion Papers 2021-08, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    3. Fang, Ximeng & Innocenti, Stefania, 2023. "Increasing the acceptability of carbon taxation: The role of social norms and economic reasoning," INET Oxford Working Papers 2023-25, Institute for New Economic Thinking at the Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford.
    4. Drews, Stefan & Savin, Ivan & van den Bergh, Jeroen C.J.M., 2022. "Biased perceptions of other people's attitudes to carbon taxation," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 167(C).
    5. Baiardi, Donatella & Morana, Claudio, 2021. "Climate change awareness: Empirical evidence for the European Union," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    6. Andersson, Ylva & McGowan, Féidhlim & Timmons, Shane & Lunn, Pete, 2023. "Status Quo bias impedes active travel policy by changing the process of opinion formation," Papers WP755, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    7. Stephan Lewandowsky & Keri Facer & Ullrich K. H. Ecker, 2021. "Losses, hopes, and expectations for sustainable futures after COVID," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 8(1), pages 1-17, December.
    8. Dehler-Holland, Joris & Schumacher, Kira & Fichtner, Wolf, 2021. "Topic Modeling Uncovers Shifts in Media Framing of the German Renewable Energy Act," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 2(1).
    9. Carl Latkin & Lauren Dayton & Catelyn Coyle & Grace Yi & Da-In Lee & Abigail Winiker, 2021. "The Relationship between Social Norms, Avoidance, Future Orientation, and Willingness to Engage in Climate Change Advocacy Communications," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(24), pages 1-14, December.
    10. Patrick Bayer & Federica Genovese, 2020. "Beliefs About Consequences from Climate Action Under Weak Climate Institutions: Sectors, Home Bias, and International Embeddedness," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 20(4), pages 28-50, Autumn.
    11. Sugandha Srivastav & Ryan Rafaty, 2023. "Political Strategies to Overcome Climate Policy Obstructionism," Papers 2304.14960, arXiv.org.
    12. Allan Dafoe & Remco Zwetsloot & Matthew Cebul, 2021. "Reputations for Resolve and Higher-Order Beliefs in Crisis Bargaining," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 65(7-8), pages 1378-1404, August.
    13. Beiser-McGrath, Liam & Busemeyer, Marius R., 2023. "Carbon inequality and support for carbon taxation," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 120925, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    14. 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.
    15. Motta, Matt & Callaghan, Timothy & Trujillo, Kristin Lunz & Lockman, Alee, 2022. "Erroneous Consonance. How Inaccurate Beliefs about Physician Opinion Influence COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy," SocArXiv 8hnxd, Center for Open Science.
    16. Christine Merk & Gernot Wagner, 2024. "Presenting balanced geoengineering information has little effect on mitigation engagement," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 177(1), pages 1-17, January.

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