This article summarizes a USC study on how very brief television news segments about extreme weather can influence public concern about climate change and support for policies that protect people from severe weather. The researchers tested how different segment framings shift attitudes, using a large, randomized sample of U.S. adults and real-world TV journalism components designed to inform and engage viewers.
Key findings from the USC study
In the experiment, 3,095 U.S. adults were randomly assigned to watch short TV reports that varied along two dimensions: whether they explicitly mentioned climate change and whether they recommended protective or adaptive actions to cope with extreme weather. Some segments did both, some did one, and some did neither.
Simply including the term “climate change” in these stories significantly increased viewers’ climate concern. Coverage focused on the realities of severe weather also raised willingness to back adaptive policies designed to reduce risk and increase resilience.
Framing matters: direct references to climate change heighten concern, while practical guidance boosts readiness to support protective measures. The study also uncovered notable political differences.
Among Republicans, there were meaningful increases in both concern and policy support after watching segments that recommended adaptation actions. Non-local stories (those not tied to the viewer’s state) proved especially effective for this group.
By contrast, Democrats showed heightened climate concern and policy support regardless of the specific segment content. This suggests that while Republican attitudes can be more responsive to targeted, actionable framing, Democratic responses may be more consistently positive across framings.
The positive effects were similar whether the weather scenarios were local to the viewer’s state or not. Local trust in weather reporting appeared robust enough to transfer across geographic relevance.
All segments were produced by journalists trained at USC’s Annenberg Center for Climate Journalism and Communication. This highlights the link between newsroom training and effective public engagement.
Lead author Wändi Bruine de Bruin and colleagues emphasize that trusted local TV news can communicate adaptation strategies in a non-polarizing way, reaching audiences across the political spectrum. The study underscores the practical value of climate journalism workshops and targeted reporter training to improve how weather and climate information is presented to the public.
Implications for climate communication and journalism
These findings offer concrete guidance for broadcasters, public health officials, and researchers seeking to foster constructive climate conversations.
They suggest that:
- Framing matters: explicitly naming climate change can raise concern, while pairing that with practical actions strengthens readiness to adopt protective policies.
- Local news has enduring credibility: even non-local weather stories can generate meaningful engagement when delivered by trusted outlets.
- Adaptive policy support can be mobilized across partisan lines through non-polarizing, action-oriented reporting.
- Reporter training matters: programs like the Annenberg Center workshops equip journalists to cover weather and climate in ways that invite public participation rather than deepen divides.
Here is the source article for this story: Study: TV news coverage of severe weather can boost support for climate action across the political aisle