Climate Change Knowledge and Political Identity in Australia

Abstract

National data from the 2018 Australian Survey of Social Attitudes show that knowledge of climate change is positively associated with the scientific consensus position on anthropogenic climate change. Responses to factual quiz questions that include climate trigger terms such as “greenhouse gas” or reference to increased ocean temperature and acidification are influenced by one’s political party identification, with Liberal and National party identifiers tending to score lower than Labor partisans on climate knowledge scales. Yet, responses to climate-related factual questions sans trigger terms are not influenced by political partisanship. Climate skeptics tend to score lower on climate knowledge scales than those who accept anthropogenic climate change, although skeptics also tend to have inflated confidence in their factual knowledge of climate change.