Encouraging climate smart behaviors through community programs: a synthesis of best practice
Abstract
As the hottest, driest region of the United States, the interior Southwest is characterized by water scarcity and drought. Climate change projections indicate increasing temperatures and decreasing precipitation especially in the southernmost parts of the region. Diverse impacts are expected from these changes in climate, including water shortages, increased energy demands, worsening threats to human and animal health, reduced agricultural yields, deteriorating ecosystem conditions and greater probability of wildfires. There is an urgent need to communicate to southwestern communities the importance of responding now to the challenges presented by climate change, and to encourage climate resilient behaviors. However, the dissemination of information by itself is unlikely to result in widespread adoption of mitigation or adaptation activities. Our objective is to determine if a volunteer-based, train-the-trainer model is a practical strategy for climate communication and for encouraging more widespread adoption of climate resilient behaviors in southwestern communities. In support of this objective, we reviewed best practice in climate mitigation and adaption outreach, synthesizing information from two sources (i) the behavioral psychology literature and (ii) interviews with existing Cooperative Extension, community outreach, and grassroots programs.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2018
- Bibcode:
- 2018AGUFMED53A..01S
- Keywords:
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- 0805 Elementary and secondary education;
- EDUCATIONDE: 0815 Informal education;
- EDUCATIONDE: 4327 Resilience;
- NATURAL HAZARDSDE: 6309 Decision making under uncertainty;
- POLICY SCIENCES