Study Says Americans Worry More About Local Issues Than Global Warming

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Global climate change may be grabbing international headlines but the results of a recent survey show that the U.S. public, while aware of the deteriorating global environment, is concerned predominantly with local and national environmental issues.

The University of Missouri press release says that David Konisky, a policy research scholar with the Institute of Public Policy, recently surveyed 1,000 adults concerning their attitudes about the environment.

“The survey’s core result is that people care about their communities and express the desire to see government action taken toward local and national issues,” said David Konisky.

“People are hesitant to support efforts concerning global issues even though they believe that environmental quality is poorer at the global level than at the local and national level. This is surprising given the media attention that global warming has recently received and reflects the division of opinion about the severity of climate change.”

Konisky is also an assistant professor in the Truman School of Public Affairs at MU, The survey polled respondents about their levels of concern for the environment and preferences for government action to address a wide set of environmental issues.

A majority of the public who were polled expressed general concern about the environment and the top three issues that the public wants the government to address are protecting community drinking water, reducing pollution of U.S. rivers and lakes, and improving urban air pollution issues like smog. In the survey, global warming ranks eighth in importance.

“Americans are clearly most concerned about pollution issues that might affect their personal health, or the health of their families,” Konisky said.

Konisky and his colleagues also found that the best predictor of individuals’ environmental preferences is their political attributes. They examined the relationship between party identification and political ideology and support for action to address environmental problems.

“The survey reinforced the stark differences in people’s environmental attitudes, depending on their political leanings,” Konisky said. “Democrats and political liberals clearly express more desire for governmental action to address environmental problems. Republicans and ideological conservatives are much less enthusiastic about further government intervention.”

Results from the survey were recently presented at the annual meeting of the Western Political Science Association in San Diego. More on the survey can be found here.