Photo by Nikolay Maslov on Unsplash.
A new poll on climate change action "shows that the political landscape among voters appears to be shifting," according to the Guardian (September 23, 2020). But when it comes to opinions about the existence and causes of climate change, which the poll also investigated (PDF), a wide partisan divide is still apparent.
Asked "Do you think that climate change is happening, or not," 72% of respondents answered yes and 14% answered no, with 14% indicating that they were not sure. Climate change was more widely accepted among respondents identifying as Democrats (87%) than among respondents identifying as independents (77%) or Republicans (53%).
Asked "Assuming climate change is happening, do you think it is ...," 59% of respondents preferred "Caused by mostly human activities" and 30% preferred "Caused mostly by natural changes in the environment," with 12% not sure. Human responsibility was more widely accepted among Democrats (76%) than independents (60%) and Republicans (38%).
The poll was conducted online on September 8-9, 2020, among 1517 registered voters in the United States. The sample was weighted based on census data for registered voters by age, gender, race, educational attainment, census region, and Hispanic ethnicity. The 95% credibility interval for the survey is +/ 2.6%.
