Understanding how frames can promote discussion and engagement with climate change: a mixed-methods investigation of framing in communication

Abstract

Climate change is a wickedly complex problem that has led to difficulties in building broad social support for climate policy, particularly in Australia. As a result, communication has been identified as one of the critical ways of engaging people on the issue and building support for solutions. Framing is a key component of communication and has been a popular research topic in recent years. However, the evidence base is vast, and debate continues as to the importance of framing in communication. While much is known about how frames can improve messaging, little is known about how frames can facilitate two-way discussion on climate change and contribute to building a broad base of social support for solutions. This thesis presents a mixed-methods investigation of framing in climate change communication resulting in both quantitative and qualitative insights. It aims to present an expanded perspective of framing by drawing on research in neighbouring disciplines. First, the evidence base of climate change framing research is systematically synthesised, providing a summary of the current state of knowledge. Analysis showed that the most studied frames in research are scientific, economic, and environmental. A key result was that experimental studies tended to have a focus on shifting individual mindsets through strategic framing. This result inspired the following chapter which presents an integrated theoretical framework focused on using framing to improve relationships and build broad social support for climate policy. The conceptual framework shows how the framing evidence base can be repositioned towards constructive engagement even in the context of social divisions. This is a departure from a dominant theme in the framing literature where framing is used as a tool for influence over preferences and perceptions of an audience. The conceptual framework is then put into practice by exploring its components through semi-structured interviews with Australia-focused climate change communication practitioners. The interviews highlighted effective communication: (1) must take place with recognition of varying contextual factors, (2) is an inherently complex job with no 'silver bullet' solution, and (3) requires that shifts in practice occur in order to keep up with shifts in social attitudes. Finally, an experimental study advances a new way of conceptualising and testing the impact of framing. Where past framing research has been characterised by research focusing on a topical sub-domain of climate change (e.g., environmental impacts), this experiment designed, and tested frames based around social agreement or disagreement and assessed the effects of those frames on respondents' willingness to communicate (a novel dependent variable). While no direct effects of the experimental manipulation were found, this chapter makes several important contributions: it provides a detailed understanding of willingness to communicate about climate change as pro-climate behaviour, it contributes a successful method for manipulating perceptions of general agreement on climate change, and demonstrates social agreement messages can have an effect if taking account of prior attitudes. In summary, this thesis contributes both quantitative and qualitative findings on how best to use frames to build social support for climate solutions and policy. It presents an expanded perspective on framing that is useful for building support now but is also well suited for the future where the focus will be in building support for other climate mitigation and adaptation solutions. Show more