An obvious question has haunted environmentalists for decades. It is echoed in various forms, one of which is implicit in the powerful statement by Tanya Steele, the Chief Executive Officer of the United Kingdom’s World Wildlife Fund: “We are the first generation to know we are destroying our planet and the last one that can do anything about it.”

Since we know our collective and individual behaviour is initiating a global climate crisis, why, then, are we so slow to take the corrective action?

An insightful answer comes from Per Espen Stoknes, a Norwegian psychologist who has recently written a book called What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming, has given a TED Talk, and is one of 100 authoritative contributor’s to Greta Thunberg’s new publication, The Climate Book.

Stoknes proposes a set of interrelated psychological dynamics that he calls the 5Ds: Distance, Doom, Dissonance, Denial and iDentity. Each one connects to the others, and all are strategies that we employ to defend our identity.

The climate crisis is distant. Although we have to act in the present, the goals of carbon dioxide reduction are for a time much removed from our immediate reality: a reduction of nearly 50% of carbon emissions by 2030, and carbon neutrality by at least 2050—preferably by 2040. The reality may also seem distant. Unless we are personally impacted by extreme weather, global warming feels like it’s happening somewhere else. Or we invent distance by attributing weather anomalies to variations in the normal, or to some other causes. And sea level rise? A few centimetres is hardly noticeable, unless we live in vulnerable locations. So most people are still able to dismiss climate change as a serious issue.

Doom, as a threat, creates one of two possible responses. If the climate crisis is inevitable, then we have no incentive to do anything but enjoy the moment without taking corrective action. And if no viable solutions are presented, then the result of the warnings is fear, helplessness and inaction. So the eventual response to frequent warnings is indifference. If it’s here, it’s too late; if it’s not, we can’t do anything about it anyway.

Dissonance is the collision between what we want and what we know. We want our lives to continue normally: consuming fossil fuels, eating meat, travelling at will, enjoying the bounties of consumerism. But these attitudes and habits are in conflict with the facts. Atmospheric carbon dioxide is rising, oceans are acidifying, glaciers are melting, all species’ populations except our own are in freefall, the planet is running out of space for anything but ourselves. The easiest solution to reduce the psychological discomfort of this tension is to diminish the importance of the facts, or even to doubt or dismiss them.

Denial is a refuge from fear and guilt by ignoring, negating or finding other ways to avoid confronting the reality of climate change. Participating in denial groups provides social support against those who are implicitly or explicitly critical of ideas or behaviours that are considered personal. Denial is not based on a lack of information or intelligence, but is a self-defensive strategy. We process information through our individual and cultural identities, always seeking to confirm the values and feelings we have. Insecure people tend to be conservative; secure people tend to be liberal. So, ironically, the worse the situation becomes, the more likely we are to be cautious and careful, a psychological dynamic that does not bode well for the radical strategies needed to solve a climate crisis that will probably become increasingly extreme.

The fifth factor, that Stoknes playfully calls iDentity, is the centre around which the others exist in concentric circles from the outside to the inside. Distance, Doom, Dissonance and Denial are all adjusted and interpreted to defend the concept of who we think we are, collectively and individually.

Critics of environmental communication strategies suggest that the principal issue to be confronted is not the substantial empirical evidence that supports any justified concern about climate change, but the psychological dynamics operating within the human persona. Since we are the source of the problem, the solution can only be found in understanding and surmounting the limitations in ourselves. Some have even called this the greatest communication failure in scientific history.

A more measured criticism would point out that the project of remaking our identity is an immensely difficult undertaking. We have spent centuries and even millennia constructing the cultures that we use to collectively define a meaningful reality. This is the place where we find belonging for our individual selves. It is not easily changed. For example, the present is bursting with profound scientific discoveries and remarkable technological accomplishments, but empiricism still has to struggle against the superstitious, the occult, and the irrational.

As always, the problem is ourselves. This is a riddle that we may never be able to solve. However, as we know from the study of history, the problem will be solved, one way or another—not necessarily to our liking, but it will be solved.

Ray Grigg for Sierra Quadra

Top image credit: Looking out through our reflection Photo by Tiago Bandeira on Unsplash