Climate change is often discussed through scientific research, weather data and public policy. But speakers during an American Community Media national briefing said meaningful conversations about the issue often begin somewhere much simpler—with people’s everyday experiences.
During the briefing, “Climate Change: The Issue That Dropped Off the Political Radar,” climate scientists and community leaders discussed why public conversations about climate have changed in recent years and how personal experiences can help people better understand an issue often explained through technical language and scientific measurements.
Karen McKinnon, a professor of statistics and the environment at UCLA, said advances in climate science have made it easier to understand how climate change influences many extreme weather events than was possible years ago. She said the challenge now is communicating those findings in ways that resonate with people.
“I don’t think that the average person, if you say the world is going to warm by two degrees Celsius… what does that mean? That doesn’t resonate with people,” McKinnon said. “But as we all unfortunately experience these impacts and can also talk about how these impacts are linked to climate change, I think that has the potential to change the narrative.”
To illustrate that point, McKinnon shared a recent experience while visiting family in Colorado.
Wildfire smoke drifting in from Colorado and Utah forced her to tell her daughter that camping outside in her grandparents’ backyard was no longer safe.
“No, it’s not safe. You can’t camp out in the backyard,” McKinnon said. “When it gets to extreme heat, you have to say, ‘No, it’s not safe. You can’t actually be outside in these conditions.'”
She said those lived experiences often help people understand climate in ways scientific terminology alone cannot.
“What we want back is a case where we’re not having smoke ruining our summers,” she said. “We’re not having the extreme heat ruining our summers. We’re really able to get back to a somewhat cooler and more stable climate state than we are right now.”
Mark Valentine, founder of ReFrame It Consulting and senior advisor to the Omega Resilience Awards, said climate-related events continue to receive significant news coverage, but the broader context is often missing.
“There’s certainly a disappearing coverage of the phenomenon of climate change, but there’s an abundance of coverage about wildfire and heat and drought,” Valentine said. “I think what’s missing is connecting those dots together for people.”
Shina Robinson, resilience projects director for the Asian Pacific Environmental Network, said conversations become more effective when they begin with the outcomes people value rather than technical policy language.
Using California’s Equitable Decarbonization Program as an example, Robinson said phrases such as “healthy and habitable homes” help people better understand how climate-related policies affect their daily lives.
“We’re talking about health. We’re talking about cleaner air in homes. We’re talking about lower asthma rates. We’re talking about safety for people’s kids,” Robinson said.
Throughout the discussion, speakers returned to a common theme: climate conversations become more meaningful when scientific information is connected to people’s lived experiences. Rather than relying solely on data or technical terminology, they encouraged communicators to frame the discussion around the places people live, the air they breathe and the experiences families already recognize.