Interestingly, most of the responses reflected anger towards reason climate change – versus its imminent impacts – with almost 60 percent of participants citing human action (or lack thereof) as the reason behind their frustration.

“We were somewhat surprised by the number of people who referred to ‘human characteristics’ when asked about reasons they were angry,” said the lead author. Thea Gregersen.

“These strong findings suggest a somewhat negative assessment of humanity—that of humans being outmoded, self-centred, egotistical, and averse to responsibility.”

Politicians and greed – especially the priority of money over the environment – ​​are also targets of public anger and are factors that are more likely to support the idea that there is a moral obligation to protest the climate crisis.

– The most important thing is that climate change anger is related to involvement in climate change, but the impact depends on the type of involvement and what makes people angry, continued Gregersen.

As she explains, for every two steps someone takes on the anger scale, they move one step on the activism scale.

However, the relationship between feelings and actions was weaker for questions regarding limiting emissions in everyday life and supporting taxes on petrol and diesel.

“Instead of fear of climate change, we should call it political fear or public fear, because it is those in power who fail to do the right thing while lying to us, or do the opposite, which causes terror,” he said. Caroline Hickmanwho leads Lancet 2021 survey.

“In the name of activism is ‘active’ behavior, and anger can spur action.