RAPID: Naturalistic effects of landmark scientific reports on public beliefs and attitudes

科学证据对公众信仰和态度的影响还没有得到很好的理解。总体而言，先前的研究表明，接触科学信息可能会改变人们的事实信念，但可能不会对人们的观点或政策偏好产生相应的影响。这项研究考虑了国际气候变化专门委员会具有里程碑意义的报告。政府间气候变化专门委员会的报告吸引了巨大的关注，但关于它们对公众舆论的影响，几乎没有实验证据。这项研究评估了接触该报告的影响，目的是解决长期存在的困惑，即科学证据对关于两极分化问题的信念和态度的影响，以及这些影响如何随人们接触的证据的数量而变化。新的知识将有助于改善有关气候变化的沟通。这项研究由围绕2023年3月IPCC报告发布的多波实验组成。一些参与者获得了在气专委报告发布后的一段时间内阅读该报告和新闻报道的奖励，而其他参与者则被鼓励阅读无关的信息。这项研究还检查了部分参与者提供的匿名在线行为数据中对IPCC新闻和信息的暴露。该研究的这一部分将关于气候变化的信念和态度与有关暴露于IPCC报告和其他在线行为的实验数据联系起来。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The effects of scientific evidence on the public's beliefs and attitudes are not well understood. In general, prior research suggests that exposure to scientific information is likely to shift people's factual beliefs but may not have corresponding effects on people's opinions or policy preferences. This study considers the landmark reports of the International Panel on Climate Change. IPCC reports attract enormous attention, but little experimental evidence exists about their effects on public opinion. This study evaluates the effects of exposure to the report with the goal of resolving longstanding puzzles about the effect of scientific evidence on beliefs and attitudes regarding polarizing issues and how these effects vary by the quantity of evidence to which people are exposed. The new knowledge will contribute to improving communications regarding climate change. This study consists of a multi-wave experiment centered around the release of the March 2023 IPCC report. Some participants receive an incentive to read the IPCC report and news coverage of it in the period after its release, while other participants are encouraged to consume unrelated information. The study also examines exposure to IPCC news and information in anonymized online behavior data provided by a subset of participants. This component of the research links beliefs and attitudes concerning climate change both to the experimental data regarding exposure to the IPCC report and to other online behavior.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.