The Yale researchers developed a statistical model to look at public opinion surrounding climate change at the state and city level. It intentionally gets pretty granular: “Although a majority of people in every state think global warming is happening, this analysis makes it possible to see how much opinions differ within each state,” Utah State’s Peter Howe said in a news release.
Interestingly, 63 percent of people think global warming is real, but just 48 percent say they believe it’s “mostly human caused.” Fifty-two percent of Americans are worried about climate change, and a similar percentage say it will affect people in the United States, but just 34 percent say it will touch their lives specifically. (For more results from the Yale study, click here.) “We have become so used to hearing a single number that represents what Americans think about this issue that just seeing the great diversity across the country was really surprising,” Jennifer Marlon, Ph.D., one of the Yale researchers who helped develop the model, told weather.com.
The Saint Leo poll puts the issue in a broader context. Of the 1,016 individuals who answered the survey, just 3 percent picked global climate change as “the most important issue facing the country today,” placing the topic well below jobs/economy and immigration, just above gun control. About one-third said climate change caused each of the following: warmer temperatures, more severe weather, terrible drought and increased ocean flooding.
http://www.weather.com/science/environment/news/majority-americans-worried-climate-change
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