Lack of ‘common sense’ in the climate change debate: Media behaviour and climate change awareness in the UK

This study investigates how traditional and new media influence people’s awareness of climate change.  The emphasis on the media is based on their ability to provide an interpretive lens to help make sense of information about environmental threats and play a pivotal role in a democratic society in presenting a story from various perspectives.  It constructs indexes of both skepticism and advocacy of climate change by showing some traits of these two perspectives and that the division between skeptics and advocates is not “black and white”, but that a transitional space exists between “hegemonic” and counter-hegemonic forces.