Biodiversity focus may bridge divides in Japanese climate action
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Researchers at Yokohama National University in Japan surveyed 1,133 people to understand how cultural beliefs influence support for environmental policies.
Aya Takagi and Ryosuke Nakadai discovered that people responded differently to policies focused on climate change versus those emphasizing biodiversity conservation. They found that hierarchical worldviews, a preference for social order, strongly correlated with less support for climate change measures, but this link was weaker for biodiversity initiatives.
The study revealed that people valuing their connection to nature generally supported all types of environmental policy, including climate and biodiversity measures. While scientific knowledge also boosted support for biodiversity conservation, cultural viewpoints had a more pronounced impact on climate policy acceptance. The researchers emphasize that simply framing climate policy as biodiversity conservation won't automatically increase its popularity, as the policies themselves differed in the survey.
They plan to conduct experiments to determine if the way policies are presented affects public support and aim to expand their research to other countries and policy areas to find common ground for broader acceptance.
