Knowing More than You Think. A study on misconceptions on the accumulation of atmospheric CO2, and what it means to understand accumulation

dc.contributor.authorFerring, Joakim
dc.contributor.authorReckermann, David
dc.contributor.departmentChalmers tekniska högskola / Institutionen för vetenskapens kommunikation och lärande (CLS)sv
dc.contributor.examinerBengmark, Samuel
dc.contributor.supervisorSterner, Erik
dc.date.accessioned2019-08-08T10:00:54Z
dc.date.available2019-08-08T10:00:54Z
dc.date.issued2019sv
dc.date.submitted2019
dc.description.abstractDespite 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.sv
dc.identifier.coursecodeCLSX35sv
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12380/300100
dc.language.isoengsv
dc.setspec.uppsokHumanitiesTheology
dc.subjectAccumulation of CO2sv
dc.subjectClimate Changesv
dc.subjectClimate Science Literacysv
dc.subjectPublic Opinionsv
dc.subjectSF failuresv
dc.subjectUptakesv
dc.subjectMisconceptionssv
dc.titleKnowing More than You Think. A study on misconceptions on the accumulation of atmospheric CO2, and what it means to understand accumulationsv
dc.type.degreeExamensarbete för masterexamensv
dc.type.uppsokH
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