From press release at Michigan State University via Eurekalert, something sure to rile almost everyone.
Published: Sept. 14, 2010
EAST LANSING, Mich. — Women tend to believe the scientific consensus on global warming more than men, according to a study by a Michigan State University researcher.
The findings, published in the September issue of the journal Population and Environment, challenge common perceptions that men are more scientifically literate, said sociologist Aaron M. McCright.
“Men still claim they have a better understanding of global warming than women, even though women’s beliefs align much more closely with the scientific consensus,” said McCright, an associate professor with appointments in MSU’s Department of Sociology, Lyman Briggs College and Environmental Science and Policy Program.
The study is one of the first to focus in-depth on how the genders think about climate change. The findings also reinforce past research that suggests women lack confidence in their science comprehension.
“Here is yet another study finding that women underestimate their scientific knowledge – a troubling pattern that inhibits many young women from pursuing scientific careers,” McCright said.
Understanding how the genders think about the environment is important on several fronts, said McCright, who calls climate change “the most expansive environmental problem facing humanity.”
“Does this mean women are more likely to buy energy-efficient appliances and hybrid vehicles than men?” he said. “Do they vote for different political candidates? Do they talk to their children differently about global warming?”
McCright analyzed eight years of data from Gallup’s annual environment poll that asked fairly basic questions about climate change knowledge and concern. He said the gender divide on concern about climate change was not explained by the roles that men and women perform such as whether they were homemakers, parents or employed full time.
Instead, he said the gender divide likely is explained by “gender socialization.” According to this theory, boys in the United States learn that masculinity emphasizes detachment, control and mastery. A feminine identity, on the other hand, stresses attachment, empathy and care – traits that may make it easier to feel concern about the potential dire consequences of global warming, McCright said.
“Women and men think about climate change differently,” he said. “And when scientists or policymakers are communicating about climate change with the general public, they should consider this rather than treating the public as one big monolithic audience.”
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Michigan State University has been advancing knowledge and transforming lives through innovative teaching, research and outreach for more than 150 years. MSU is known internationally as a major public university with global reach and extraordinary impact. Its 17 degree-granting colleges attract scholars worldwide who are interested in combining education with practical problem solving.
Contact: Andy Henion, University Relations, Office: (517) 355-3294, Cell: (517) 281-6949, Andy.Henion@ur.msu.edu; Aaron M. McCright, Sociology and Lyman Briggs, Office: (517) 432-8026, mccright@msu.edu
Pat Frank says:
September 14, 2010 at 10:01 pm
I think we should put Aaron M. McCright alone in a room with Lucia, Lucy Skywalker, and Pamela Gray. I’m guessing he’d suffer an epiphany.
That sounds painful – is that the one with the testicle up each nostril?
The various comments about how men and women navigate can often be traced down to physical differences in the brain. There’s been various studies done that indicate that the area of the brain in men which controls spacial awareness is the part of the brain in women which holds color gamut.
This means that statistically speaking, men have red, yellow, blue etc while women can tell the difference between green, jade, orange,amber, purple, magenta etc.
However, put both in a room where they know where the obstacles are, but can’t see them – women tend to hit them more often. The price for increased color gamut is reduced spacial awareness and vice-versa.
This is of course statistically speaking. Some men have more “womens” brains and some women “mens” brains – at least in this area (it’s not a general thing).
As with so many things, it’s more complicated than it first appears…
The Lady Gaga meat dress: Proper beef should be hung for at least 21 days. But 60 pounds is impressive, I didn’t think she was that strong.
wanglese says:
September 14, 2010 at 8:05 pm
I’m not going to dengrate women. I think the study is probably flawed. However, it isn’t accidental that in Australia the womens magazines have pages and pages of adverts for the “worlds greatest psychics – call now!”, and a bunch of other woo-woo, along with the nonsense articles and astrology, feng-shui and the like. It isn’t accidental that you can walk into a newsagenbt and buy “Witchcraft” magazines, complete with “spells to snare your man!”
What these things are to women, conspiracy theories are to men. A small minority are believers, many others are interested in them for entertainment only.
I think I’ve lost a comment…
Some one needs to check his model and his raw data. I detect a bias.
Folks you’re looking at this the wrong way.
Women are just hedging their bets, being pragmatic.
Global warming means warmer temperatures; means less clothing to wear; means more skin to show; means they’ll need to stay in better shape.
It’s all about appearance and competition with their fellow females. 🙂
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Garry says:
September 14, 2010 at 5:32 pm
Ha ha. I wonder whether he asked any control questions about trigonometry, astrophysics, neurology, or machine language?….
__________________________________________________________
I doubt he can even SPELL those words much less understand what they mean.
—-
As a female chemist who graduated in 1972 (BS) I would like to add the following:
I was not allowed to take shop, I had to take Home Ec instead (I flunked it in protest) I wanted to be a Chem Engineer but my counselor in college assigned me to chemistry only classes and I was a sophomore before I figured out he had switched my major without telling me.
As a female we were pushed into the socially acceptable “nurturing” framework. Those females who were interested in math and science had a real fight on their hands so I am not surprised at the findings of this study.
I realize it is different now but there are still a lot of women around who were brainwashed into allowing others to do their thinking when it comes to science thanks to the subtle messages that “science and math is for men” from their teachers. This mind set is ruthlessly exploited by the use of cuddly seal pups and polar bear cubs designed to bring out a woman’s nurturing instincts.
The emotional message is going to have a much greater “win” with women compared to the “scientific” message “win” for men.
You might want to check your history on that. You then might be surprised abut which party has actually enacted more civil rights legislation, which one tried to block and filibuster it, which one formed the iconic hooded group, etc., etc. The other party talks the talk, but balks at the walk.
Groan And what do you suppose would be the ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ answers on such a mini-quiz?
Self-reported knowledge assessments are far superior to the results of any quiz composed by McWrong.
Tsk. You still dung git it. Street signs are
landmarks. North-south and east-west are independent of such trivia!
>:)
This academic may be surprised by reality, as most of them would be, if they ever could encounter it.
I am certain there are more of the fairer, lovelier, more sweetly reasonable persuasion amongst the skeptics than he has reckoned.
Earlier I wrote a simple statement of fact,
“But virtually all major US scientific organizations (and internationally, many more) have made statements agreeing with the scientific consensus that human activities including greenhouse gas emissiona are changing the climate. These include the American Chemical Society, American Statistical Association, American Physical Society, American Meteorological Society, along with many others.”
Brian H took umbrage,
“the pronouncements you so tritely list are by the admin Head Orifice types. They have mightily riled their actual members by speaking falsely on their behalf.”
No other content so I don’t know which major US scientific organizations he has in mind, where such pronouncements are made by “admin Head Orifice types.” Perhaps he will specify. For all the organizations I belong to, the presidents and boards of directors are elected by the membership, and we can vote them out if we don’t like what they do. They tend to be prominent scientists, and board members don’t work at any head office.
Dan in California is more substantive, writing,
“I stand by my statement that working scientists in the “hard” sciences and engineers are skeptical that anthropogenic CO2 is more than a minor factor in climate.”
then backing this up with some reports of dissent in APS, AGU and ACS.
But of course there’s dissent. These are large, diverse societies. AGU alone has some 55,000 members across many different fields, who don’t all think with one mind. But can you cite any evidence that most oppose the statements by their organization (and the research in their journals) to the effect that human activities including greenhouse gas emissions are changing the climate?
In response to member comments, the AGU complexified its position by adding realistic caveats while keeping the heart of the original statement, that human activities are measurably changing the climate. You can read both the 2007 statement and 2010 caveats here, and spin that at will:
http://www.aps.org/policy/statements/07_1.cfm
Here’s a 2010 update from the American Chemical Society, where likewise there was some dissent including calls to replace an editor, but years later it didn’t shift the center and the editor remains:
http://pubs.acs.org/cen/editor/88/8835editor.html
It runs against the grain of this website to believe so, but there is a consensus among active scientists that human activities including greenhouse gas emissions are measurably changing the climate. Not unanimous, to be sure, but it would be hard to attend the meetings, read the newsletters and journals, or talk with a broad range of your colleagues in the organizations I know about without seeing the breadth and depth of the evidence, across many different fields. It’s their own evidence and knowledge, not some “party line” or “admin Head Orifice types,” that the consensus rests on.
This has inspired me to organize a $5000 annual prize for the most stupid, climate exploiting study – honors will be shared between the authors, the university and funding bodies.
The best way to find stupidity is to publicly laugh at them.
“It runs against the grain of this website to believe so, but there is a consensus among active scientists that human activities including greenhouse gas emissions are measurably changing the climate.”
Gneiss,
The problem is consensus doesn’t make any particular belief true or false. It’s irrelevant. You are appealing to authority, just like every other AGW advocate who has commented here. You aren’t presenting anything here that hasn’t been presented countless times before. You might think you have some fresh-looking appeal to authority, but you don’t even have that. Your take was old years ago.
Andrew
“New” Earth creation is a literal interpretation of the book of Genesis which puts the age of the planet at less than 10,000 years. In order to believe that you have to have very little scientific training/interest or a willingness to put science aside and take it as a matter of faith. (Did you know there’s a museum just outside Cincinatti dedicated to creation “science.”) I was just trying to counter this sociology prof’s assertion. If women know their stuff when it comes to science because they are more likely to believe in CAGW, why do more women believe in new Earth creation? Another guy did a good job expanding on this asking why more women are involved with horoscopes, tarot cards, psychics, fung shui, etc.
Gneiss,
One would have to be a complete fool to believe that human activity has no effect on the planet, climate included. But what, exactly, does “measurable” mean? If I send Bill Gates one dollar, the change to his personal wealth is in fact measurable. Completely meaningless, but measurable. The question is not are we having a “measurable” effect on climate, the question is are we having a SIGNIFICANT effect on climate, and is it detrimental? The evidence suggests that natural variability is far in excess of our “measurable” effect, that both CO2 and temperature increases are in fact a mixed result with far more positives than negatives, and lastly, the scientists at the forefront of climate alarmism continue to use poor statistical analysis techniques and keep their original data and the manner in which it was adjusted and/or analyzed secret. I ask you, if you had knowledge of an impending earth quake, or a tsunami, or some other disaster that would result in a major loss of life, would you shout it from the roof tops to warn everyone? And when someone asked you to prove it, would you not produce every last shred of evidence you had in an effort to save lives? Of course you would. You wouldn’t respond with a condescending sneer that your evidence is proprietary and no one else can look at it, would you?
As for the societies, allow me this observation in regard to Roberts Rules of Order. When a society is operated in regard to the common interests and issues of the membership, it rarely steps outside of its own area of expertise. When a small group of activists with a specific agenda outside the area of expertise want to however, the nature of Roberts Rules of Order in the hands of a determined clique can easily hijack the society as a whole. Disgruntled members may leave, but more often they remain silent, the value of the society to them on the issues for which they joined it still out weighs their disagreement with the politics. Hence when I read an opinion by a scientist in their field of expertise, I focus on the science. When as society issues a statement couched in ambiguous terms with a political position inherent in the statement, I stop paying attention.
So tell me not about what the societies have said or not said. Show me the science, show me the data, show me the analysis and show me the real world results that confirm it all. I’ve been reading everything from IPCC AR4 to WUWT and frankly, I’ve not seen anything approaching science, data, analysis and results that would suggest anything extroardinary happening to the climate.
David70 says:
September 15, 2010 at 7:55 pm
“New” Earth creation is a literal interpretation of the book of Genesis which puts the age of the planet at less than 10,000 years. In order to believe that you have to have very little scientific training/interest or a willingness to put science aside and take it as a matter of faith.>>
I had a professor in university who had a Phd in Geophysics, and firmly believed that the earth was only a few thousand years old. One day I asked how he could reconcile that belief while teaching us how to date the age of fossils that were millions of years old. He picked up some fossilized sea creature off his desk and said that when it was created less than 6,000 years ago, it was created millions of years old with a history to match, and it was of interest to him to study that history. If his interest was in “why”, he would have become a priest.
The two aren’t mutualy exclusive.
I am well aware of the histories related to party platforms and how they have changed over the decades and century. My dear grandpa (who raised me) was an old school racist Democrat from Missouri. When he first joined the party, women’s rights, real racial equality, etc, were foreign to the Southern Democratic Party. If it was liberty you sought as a woman, your closest bet was the Republican Party. By the time I was old enough to vote, party planks had switched sides. And so it goes with party platforms. They change as often as the weather does.
Im a woman and am skeptical of AGW, not necessarily in that order.
One thing that is obvious to someone from a science / health background is the obvious confounding factors in a survey based study of this nature: Women are less likely to create oppositional interpersonal situations, we prefer to get along and let discretion be the better part of valour. Any of you who have been on the recieving end of an ad hominen personal attack due to a skeptical AGW stance would have some insight into why women would be more likely to go with the party line in public, avoid rocking the boat and go away and blog irately under a nom de blog about shoddy science. Or is that just me?
Gail Combs
Nobody does my thinking for me.That includes feminist groups who tell me that I am as good as any man.I don’t care about climate science.When it comes down to it,climate science has no benefit at all.All those years studying and researching for a gain of what?I would have been happy to see the billions wasted on so-called climate science policies spent on medical research.
The medical research industry is rife with corruption,but I am sitting here today typing because of medical research.Real benefits I can see,like my mother kept alive for 15 years after heart problems.
I always read the latest studies on medical research,it has ended so much misery in the world.How much misery can climate scientists end?
It seems to me that climate scientists have manufactured or went along with the global warming hysteria to justify their existence,they get a free pass while drug companies are attacked from all sides.
Z says:
September 15, 2010 at 3:26 pm
“And finally, for all those hetrosexual males out there (though it could be formulated for anyone) if she was dressed an a fur bikini, and she bounced with excitement (and hence ‘jiggled’) every time you said how much you said you liked polar bears – would you change your answers? ;)”
Being a bit seasoned(older),my answer is ….. NO.
I know that this is a use of feminine attraction, or more to the point “sex sells”. There will ALWAYS be a young guy who will fall for this when it comes to spending a few minutes flirting and talking to a pretty girl they will never have but in their heads. No one really harmed except for ditching your principles, but thinking with our lower heads and letting it control our judgment is nothing new since the dawn of time.
We are only human, and the woman are the same as us(if not worse) when it comes to needing to want to be sexually attractive. This is what makes it the spice of life and creates so much conflict between the sex’s. Who am I to judge someone else for using what they were born with to make a living? Using looks and sexual attraction to get votes/signatures is as degrading as a person who lets it cloud their judgment. Sometimes doing the wild thing will take over and make you say and do whatever it takes, this is what it is and have more then a few times done things from it’s control. Oh and is her bikini made of polar bear skin? 🙂
Ok, I’ve changed my answer…YES!! hehehehe! :p LOL
These include . . . American Statistical Association
Hmmm. A statistical society that endorses a belief based largely on refusal to release statistical data. You can’t make this stuff up, folks.
Brian H says:
September 15, 2010 at 5:15 pm
Tsk. You still dung git it. Street signs are landmarks.
I don’t know where you come from but in my navigational world a landmark is usually a building, structure or geographic feature – like Churches, Bridges and Rivers… on the other hand Street Signs in my world are tiny little plaques hidden from view in the urban landscape – like nailed to a wall 50 yards away, 20 feet above eye level and obscured behind the leafy branches of a tree… otherwise it is covered in spray paint or hanging in some kids bedroom as a memory of some drunken night out. So I still dung get it! Perhaps that’s why men like playing with their Sat Navs so much… and the irony is that the Sat Nav voices are usually female. Sat Navs must be male toys because they are so useless… they are great on the open road where you don’t need them… use Sat Nav in the city centre of Lisbon, Portugal and it tells you to turn left through the front door of a house that has been standing there for three hundred years… use Sat Nav on the ring roads around Madrid, Spain and you end up outside the entrance to the emergency department in a hospital somewhere on the road to Toledo… such is life… perhaps men should stick to 2D maps… while women can use 3D maps, landmarks or (horrors of horrors) simply ask for directions…
David70 says:
September 15, 2010 at 7:55 pm
It’s called Young Earth Creationism or YEC not New Earth Creation.
Reply: Can we please stop discussing any form of Creationism for any reason or comparison? This is generally a prohibited topic. I’m granting some leeway here, and not deleting a dozen comments, but this stops now. ~ ctm
McCright analyzed eight years of data from Gallup’s annual environment poll that asked fairly basic questions about climate change knowledge and concern.
Now the thing I hate about these surveys is they usually give you multiple choice answers but they NEVER have my answer…
SURVEY QUESTION: Will you vote for X in the next election.
SURVEY ANSWERS: a) Yes, b) No, c) Maybe
MY ANSWERS: a) I never vote – it only encourages them, b) It doesn’t matter who I vote for the government always gets in. c) My vote never counts because my choice always loses.
So I never trust polls… the questions and answers are both rigged… and people don’t always tell the truth… I remember when I lived in Wales (that large empty green field on Google maps) my local doctor got a backhander and released my personal details to some “doctor” performing government sponsored research into mental health… so the multiple page tick box questionaire duly arrived in the post… it was immediately obvious that the researcher worked in mental health ie: a total fruit cake.
QUESTION: How often do you think about committing suicide?
TICK BOXES: a) Once a month, b) once a week, c) once a day, d) once an hour.