What Influences Early-Teens' Views of Climate Change in Humboldt County, California?

Overview

Objectives/Goals Climate change is one of the biggest challenges my generation will face. The purpose of my project was to find what factors influence junior high students' opinions on climate change. Methods/Materials I designed an online survey using Surveygizmo presenting various questions around different topics shown to influence people's opinions of climate change. I sent my survey to schools across Humboldt County. Results I surveyed a total of 204 students, 85% of which believed climate change was happening. The top 3 student concerns were melting glaciers, forest fires, and drought. While time spent outdoors generally didn't affect belief in climate change, people who visited more national parks were more likely to say climate change was happening. Overall students' opinions on climate change were influenced most by scientific studies, news coverage, and parents; in fact, students who said they didn't believe in climate change were most influenced by news coverage. Teens who believed in climate change also said that they thought adults weren't doing enough to prevent it. Conclusions/Discussion My study found that a higher percentage of teens in Humboldt County believe in climate change than the adults in Humboldt County and in the the rest of the nation. I also found that most students think adults are not doing enough to prevent climate change and this tells me that my generation will have to lead efforts to fight climate change.

Awards (1)

• Third Place

Competition history

• CSEF 2017 Behavioral & Social Sciences · Entry J0425

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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