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Peer-reviewed article

The “Gateway Belief” illusion: reanalyzing the results of a scientific-consensus messaging study

December 13, 2017 | Media and Technology
This paper analyzes data collected but not reported in the study featured in van der Linden, Leiserowitz, Feinberg, and Maibach [van der Linden et al., 2015]. VLFM report finding that a “scientific consensus” message “increased” experiment subjects' “key beliefs about climate change” and “in turn” their “support for public action” to mitigate it. However, VLFM fail to report that message-exposed subjects' “beliefs about climate change” and “support for public action” did not vary significantly, in statistical or practical terms, from those of a message-unexposed control group. The paper also shows how this absence of an experimental effect was obscured by a misspecified structural equation model.

TEAM MEMBERS

  • Dan Kahan
    Author
    Yale Law School
  • Citation

    ISSN : 1824-2049
    Publication Name: Journal of Science Communication
    Volume: 16
    Number: 5
    Resource Type: Research Products
    Discipline: Climate | Education and learning science
    Audience: General Public | Scientists | Learning Researchers
    Environment Type: Media and Technology | Broadcast Media

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