Multilevel predictors of climate change beliefs in Africa

RESEARCH ARTICLE Multilevel predictors of climate change beliefs in Africa Juan B. Gonza´lezID1*, Alfonso Sa´ nchezID2 1 Paris School of Economics and University Paris 1 Panthe´ on-Sorbonne, Paris, France, 2 Department of International Studies, Universidad Loyola, Dos Hermanas, Spain * Juan-Bautista.Gonzalez-Blanco@etu.univ-paris1.fr Abstract Although Africa is the most vulnerable region to climate change, little research has focused on how climate change is perceived by Africans. Using random forest methodology, we ana- lyze survey and climate data from second-order political boundaries to explore what predicts climate change beliefs in Africa. We include five different dimensions of climate change beliefs: climate change awareness, belief in anthropogenic climate change, risk perception, the need to stop climate change, and self-efficacy. Based on these criteria we identify five key results: (1) climate change in Africa is largely perceived through its negative impacts on agriculture; (2) actual changes in local climate conditions are related to climate change beliefs; (3) authoritarian and intolerant ideologies are associated to less climate change awareness, and a diminished risk perception and belief that it must be stopped; (4) women are less likely to be aware of climate change, and (5) not speaking French, English or Portu- guese is linked to a hindered understanding of climate beliefs. Our combined results can help policy makers better understand the need to jointly consider the multilevel complexities

of individual beliefs and hydroclimatic data for the development of more accurate adaptation and mitigation strategies to combat the impacts of climate change in Africa. Introduction The most up-to-date scientific evidence indicates that climate change has already caused “widespread and pervasive impacts to people and ecosystems” and that it continues to be “a threat to human well-being and planetary health” [1]. Urgent mitigation and adaptation strate- gies are required at all levels of analysis to lessen the impact from climate change. However, such mitigation strategies are not being implemented fast enough [1]. Aside from material, institutional, and political constraints, there are cognitive barriers about climate change that also delay the implementation of these strategies [2–4]. For instance, despite strong scientific consensus about the existence of anthropogenic climate change only 51% of Africans believe that human activity is the main cause behind climate change [5]. These gaps in climate change beliefs erode public support towards environmental policies and limit individual behavioral changes that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions [6–8]. Therefore, understanding what predicts climate change beliefs (CCBs) is crucial for policy makers to implement effective PLOS ONE PLOS ONE | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0266387 April 5, 2022 1 / 14 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 OPEN ACCESS Citation: Gonza´lez JB, Sa´nchez A (2022) Multilevel predictors of climate change beliefs in Africa. PLoS

ONE 17(4): e0266387. https://doi.org/10.1371/ journal.pone.0266387 Editor: Natalie J. Shook, University of Connecticut, UNITED STATES Received: July 5, 2021 Accepted: March 18, 2022 Published: April 5, 2022 Copyright: © 2022 Gonza´lez, Sa´nchez. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Data Availability Statement: All data and code files needed to replicate the analysis and figures are publicly available at GitHub: https://github.com/ jbgb13/PredictorsCCB_PLOS. Funding: Juan Gonza´lez gratefully acknowledges the financial support from The Spanish National Science Foundation (PGC2018-093506-B-I00) and Excelencia Junta de Andalucia (PY-18-FR-0007). Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.