Eric Pfeiffer

A study published in the October issue of Global Environmental Change seems to confirm what many had already assumed for years: If you’re a white man and self-identified political conservative, you are far more likely to question the science behind global climate change than the overall population at large. Some of the key figures:

- 14% of the general public doesn’t worry about climate change at all, but among CWMs the percentage jumps to 39%.
- 32% of adults deny there is a scientific consensus on climate change, but 59% of CWMs deny what the overwhelming majority of the world’s scientists have said.
- 3 adults in 10 don’t believe recent global temperature increases are primarily caused by human activity. Twice that many – 6 CWMs out of every ten – feel that way

Of course, like any political survey, the results are being met with some resistance:

“My worry is that [the paper] might suggest to people that there is something distinctive about the way conservatives and officially, conservative white men, deal with new information,” said Donald Braman, associate professor of law at George Washinton University, who works on risk perception studies. “The truth is that those same cognitive mechanisms push all of our buttons.”

Read more here, h/t io9