Does Fossil Fuel Dependence Influence Public Awareness and Perception of Climate Change? A Cross-National Investigation

This study presents an empirical cross-national analysis of the influence of fossil fuel (or carbon) dependence on climate change public opinion using ordinary least squares and robust regression modeling of aggregate, national-level data from Gallup World Poll surveys conducted in 2010. These provide measures of public awareness, perceived risk, and perceived human cause of climate change among general publics in over 100 countries. Three measures of fossil fuel dependence are examined: carbon dioxide emissions per capita, fossil fuel production dependence, and fossil fuel consumption dependence. The measure "carbon emissions per capita" is negatively associated with perceived risk and perceived human cause of climate change, but it is not associated with public awareness. However, when separately examining the production and consumption dimensions of fossil fuel dependence, the results indicate that greater dependence on fossil fuel production is significantly associated with lower public awareness, perceived risk, and perceived human cause of climate change; meanwhile, dependence on fossil fuel consumption has no significant effect on these three measures. These findings suggest that fossil fuel dependence, particularly dependence on the production of fossil fuels, shapes public understanding, skepticism, and risk perception of climate change and may do so mainly via economic interests and efforts to defend them.