Hurricane Risk Perceptions

As Superstorm Sandy battered the U.S. East Coast in 2012, residents in communities along the Connecticut shore received “mandatory” evacuation orders, but most people didn’t leave. Our new study, “Hurricane Attitudes of Coastal Connecticut Residents: A Segmentation Analysis,” provides insights into why some people decide to evacuate in the face of a weather emergency and why others try to ride out the storm.

Overview video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eS_VINzDI8U

Download reports: https://climatecommunication.yale.edu/publications/coastal-ct-hurricane-segments/


Yale Climate Opinion Maps

Public opinion about global warming is an important influence on decision making about policies to reduce global warming or prepare for the impacts, but American opinions vary widely depending on where people live. So why would we rely on just one national number to understand public responses to climate change at the state and local levels? Public opinion polling is generally done at the national level, because local level polling is very costly and time intensive. In collaboration with Peter Howe, Matto Mildenberger, Anthony Leiserowitz, and the YPCCC, we developed a geographic and statistical model to downscale national public opinion results to the state, congressional district, and county levels. We can now estimate public opinion across the country and provide a rich picture of the diversity of Americans’ beliefs, attitudes, and policy support about climate change.

Nile Climate History

This project examines the link between explosive volcanic eruptions and the annual Nile river summer flooding in antiquity. Large volcanic eruptions can reduce average global temperatures and suppress average global precipitation. This is known to have had dramatic effects on annual rainfall on the Nile watershed in historic times. The human response to this annual flooding, and to its variability over the years, was the major driver of Egyptian history up to the completion of the high dam at Aswan in 1970.

Link: https://nileclimateproject.netlify.com/

Extreme Heat Risk Perceptions

In order to prepare for extreme heat, Americans need to be aware that it is a serious threat to human health. Using a 0 – 100 scale (where 0 = no perceived risk from extreme heat & 100 = maximum risk), we mapped Americans’ risk perceptions of the health risks of extreme heat events (heat waves) at the state, county, and census tract level across the U.S.  Higher values indicate that people perceive greater risks from heat waves to their own health, the health of their families, and the health of their local communities. Read the paper here: Howe et al., 2019.