Gauging concerns about climate change in Great Lakes coastal communities

Concerns about climate change among the U.S. population increasingly mirror those of the scientific community. Yet, beliefs and levels of concern vary across different regions of the country. Because geographic locations are being affected by climate change in distinct ways, citizens in more vulnerable locations will likely express greater concern about climate change than individuals whose localities are less likely to have been noticeably affected to date. Using data from a survey of residents in the Grand Traverse Bay region of Michigan and the “Six Americas of Global Warming” audience segmentation tool developed by Maibach el al. (2011), we found that residents in the Grand Traverse Bay Watershed, a coastal region predicted to be especially vulnerable to climate change, express a greater degree of concern about climate change than do residents of the U.S. more generally. Also, using ordinal regression, we found participation in outdoor recreation, as well as demographic variables including gender, education, income and age are predictors of concern about climate change as measured by placement in a Six Americas segment.