Knowing More than You Think. A study on misconceptions on the accumulation of atmospheric CO2, and what it means to understand accumulation
Typ
Examensarbete för masterexamen
Program
Publicerad
2019
Författare
Ferring, Joakim
Reckermann, David
Modellbyggare
Tidskriftstitel
ISSN
Volymtitel
Utgivare
Sammanfattning
Despite global agreements to limit the effects of anthropogenic climate change, emissions
of CO2 continue to rise as societies globally have yet to make the necessary
readjustments to turn the trend. It has been suggested by some researchers of public
climate science literacy that one reason for public complacency about climate change
could be lacking understanding of the relationship between emissions, uptake, and
total amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Research has shown lay people have difficulties
applying fundamental physical principles when performing tasks on CO2
accumulation by, for example, providing answers implying that the level of atmospheric
CO2 can stabilise even while the rate of emissions of CO2 exceeds the rate of
uptake. This type of misconception, failing to grasp the stock and flow (SF) nature
of a dynamic system, has been termed stock and flow failure (SF failure). Several
perspectives have been used by researchers to understand and suggest interventions
to counteract SF failure, where one recently suggested perspective aims to elaborate
what it means to "understand" SF dynamics. From this perspective, understanding
accumulation of atmospheric CO2 involves several forms of knowledge, and to successfully
perform different tasks demands different forms of knowledge.
In order to further investigate using this perspective to explain the frequency of
SF failure, a survey was conducted on engineering students (N=131) at Chalmers
University of Technology, Gothenburg. The survey was designed to quantitatively
study to what extent people possess the knowledge of the concepts and procedures
required to successfully perform tasks on accumulation of atmospheric CO2, but lack
the demanded knowledge of when to apply these concepts and tools. Also, misconceptions
regarding processes through which CO2 is removed from the atmosphere
were investigated, as well as possible correlations between misconceptions concerning
CO2 accumulation and opinion on emission reduction.
The results of the study show that people perform differently on a variety of tasks
considered to demand the same knowledge of concepts and procedures, which could
be explained by difficulty of knowing when to apply these concepts and procedures
varying across the range of tasks. This substantiates a suggestion made in previous
research, that high rates of SF failure in the CO2 context could be heavily influenced
by inability to invoke and apply the required knowledge, rather than simply
not knowing. Also, novel results are presented showing major misconceptions concerning
removal of CO2 from the atmosphere, where subjects heavily underestimate
uptake of CO2 by the ocean, and believe notable amounts of CO2 leaves the atmosphere
into space or decomposes. Further, no clear correlations between opinion on
emission reduction and SF failure was found. Implications for practise and future
research are discussed.
Beskrivning
Ämne/nyckelord
Accumulation of CO2 , Climate Change , Climate Science Literacy , Public Opinion , SF failure , Uptake , Misconceptions