By Laura Husband

Mass psychology may be the missing piece of the jigsaw for climate scientists and politicians who want us to take action to avoid global catastrophe, says Dr Robbie Sutton, senior lecturer at the University of Kent.

A poll of 1,500 people published in The Times newspaper showed that over half of those questioned were not convinced climate change was a problem, and thought it was natural rather than a man-made phenomenon.

“This is quite shocking,” said Dr Sutton. “We live in a society with a wacky postmodern view of science.”

Green Party Leader and Member of European Parliament Caroline Lucas said: “People are understandably confused about the science. All they see are politicians coming at them with green taxes, without being able to see clearly the benefits of a cleaner, healthier and greener society.”

We do not need to be constantly reminded of impending doom or bribed with savings on our electricity bills, “we just need politicians to make it as easy as possible for people to live greener lives,” Ms Lucas explained.

A psychology experiment published last year showed that individuals often do not understand their own particular attitudes and behaviours related to climate change.

The study focused on hotel bathroom signs that commonly read, “Please reuse your towels to help us save the environment.”

The signs were only found to be effective if they were phrased in a certain way. When the signs read “seventy five per cent of hotel guests in this room recycled their towels,” the majority of guests would choose to follow suit. But fewer guests were inclined to reuse their towels if the sign simply mentioned saving the environment. Lead researcher Noah Goldstein, said: “There was no logical reason for this,” as the hotel guests knew nothing more about the 75 per cent of people who had recycled, other than the fact they had shared the same room.

“If people think others are carrying out a behaviour, they are more likely to do it too. It’s mindless conformity,” said Dr Sutton.

A conservation psychologist from the University of Arkansas, Jessica Nolan, found a similar tendency to conform in people who participated in her own experiment. She asked participants what would make them want to conserve energy. Most said they would do it to benefit society, with a minority saying they would conserve because their neighbours were doing it.

But when she tested these views the contrary was seen to be true. People who received fliers in their letterboxes saying, “Conserve energy, your neighbours are doing it,” conserved more energy than those who received fliers telling them to save energy to benefit society.

Nolan concludes, “Although people may not believe the behaviour of others should motivate them to conserve energy, their behaviour was powerfully influenced by it nonetheless.”

So how can we change people’s attitudes and behaviours to make them want to save the environment?

“With huge social problems, people often think their own little changes don’t make a difference," but there is "zero cost to making psychological changes” for both individuals and politicians, said Dr Sutton.

The media have tried to change people’s attitudes and behaviours towards helping the environment, but this fight may have been in vain according to psychological researchers at the University of Victoria in Canada. “Media representations about climate change do not help resolve judgements of uncertainty,” researchers Leila Scannell and Frederick Grouzet said in a recent paper. Journalists try to remain “non-partisan and objective”, but in doing so give “credibility to sceptics by making them appear equal to pro-climate change scientists.”

Attitudes can be changed by the media explains David Uzzell, professor of environmental psychology at the University of Surrey, but should concentrate on making arguments that are “meaningful to people’s everyday lives. Otherwise you’ll get a distancing effect, where individuals will detach themselves from climate change because it appears to be happening a long way away.”