Opinions of 12 to 13-year-olds in Austria and Australia on the worry, cause and imminence of Climate Change

Although we are in the third decade of climate science communication as a discipline, and there is overwhelming scientific consensus and physical evidence for climate change, the general public continues to wrestle with climate change policy and advocacy. Early adolescence (12 to 13 years old) is a critical but under-researched demographic for the formation of attitudes related to climate change. This paper presents opinions on the worry, cause, and imminence of climate change that were collected from n=463 1st year secondary school students (12-13 years old) in public secondary schools in inner-urban centres in Austria and Australia. Overall, 86.83% of eligible respondents agreed that climate change was probably or definitely something we should worry about, 80.33% agreed that climate change was probably or definitely caused by humans, and 83.17% agreed that climate change was probably or definitely something that was happening now. The respondents opinions were also compared to their respective adult population, with Australian 12-13 year olds showing strong positive climate-friendly attitudes, both in comparison to their adult population, and to their Austrian peers. In addition, although the opinions of Austrian 12-13 year olds were quite high, they did not reflect the higher climate-friendly opinions of their adult community. Our results suggest that socio-cultural worldview or socio-cultural cognition theory may not have the influence on this age group as it does on the respective adult population - and, if they are affected, there are attitudes or factors in this age group which resist the opinion-influence from their mature community. These findings are significant as early adolescents may be pivotal in the climate science communication arena and investigating their opinions with regard to climate change may offer an unexplored and under-utilised target for future communication efforts and climate literacy programmes.