Determinants of Climate Change Beliefs in Latin America

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Determinants of Climate Change Beliefs in Latin America

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Policymakers struggle to come up with messages to effectively promote pro-climate political mobilization in the Global South. In order to identify what factors matter most in sensitizing public opinion in the developing world, this article highlights the main determinants of belief in the existence of climate change, its causes, and its consequences. We field surveys to nationally diverse samples in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, and Mexico (N= 5338), a group of countries accounting for more than 80% of Latin America’s carbon emissions. We find that belief in the existence of climate change and its human causes is generalized, but there is no consensus around the severity of its consequences. Driving the skepticism is not political ideology but the presence of individualistic values, a worrisome conclusion in a region marked by relatively low levels of trust in political institutions and trust in others.

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Scholars have in recent years shifted their attention from the distribution of climate change beliefs among individuals to the socio-political, demographic, and psychological factors that account for those beliefs.¹-² The resulting research shows that beliefs about the existence, the causes, and the consequences of climate change are strongly influenced by values, ideology, worldviews, and political orientation.³-⁴-⁵ What we do not know is how well these findings travel across borders. By and large, existing studies are limited to wealthy democracies,⁶-⁷ with

an emphasis on the United States,⁸-⁹ the United Kingdom,¹⁰ Germany,¹¹ and Australia.¹² While there is no doubt that evidence from these countries greatly improves our understanding of the individual-level factors shaping people’s beliefs about climate change, work in other places needs to be done if we are to understand how these and other factors play out in different social settings.¹³-¹⁴

The gap in knowledge about the determinants of belief in climate change is particularly wide when it comes to the Global South. Studies are few and far between, and the bulk of existing research is based on data collected by the Gallup World Poll (2007-2010)^15_16 at a time when concern for climate change was far less prominent than it is today. Other valuable work in the field is based on general surveys that only tackle a limited number of theory-grounded individual-level antecedents of climate change beliefs (e.g. the World Values Survey, Latinobarometer¹⁷, and Afrobarometer¹⁸). As a result, we know little about the factors determining how preferences over climate change are formed beyond the Western world. Given the fact that poor and developing countries will be disproportionately affected by climate change,¹⁹ and that beliefs in the existence, causes, and consequences of climate change are integral to effective climate action,²⁰-²¹ a fuller picture of the individual-level factors driving public perceptions beyond the West is rather urgent.

This article examines the determinants of climate change perceptions in Latin America. The data come from an original survey conducted between November and December 2021 from nationally diverse samples in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, and Mexico (N= 5338). Together, these countries account for more than 80% of regional carbon emissions and exert sovereign jurisdiction over some of the most diverse and threatened biomes on the planet. To provide as complete a picture as possible, we focus on the determinants of belief in climate change along three different dimensions, namely the existence of climate change, its causes and its consequences.²²-²³ We do so by focusing on two types of variable that scholars take to be foundational for the formation of beliefs in climate change:²⁴ political and socio-demographic (gender, age, education, religion, political ideology, political orientation, income, and race) and psychological (objective²⁵ and subjective knowledge,²⁶ trust in scientists,²⁷ perceived scientific consensus,²⁸ the New Ecological Paradigm,²⁹ individualistic and egalitarianist worldviews,³⁰-³¹ and personal experience of extreme weather events³²). In the remainder of this article, we present our main findings and then discuss them with an eye to identifying valuable avenues for future research.

Climate Change Perceptions in Latin America

The perception is overwhelmingly consensual across Latin America that climate change is happening (over 90% in all countries) (Supplementary Table 4), and that its chief cause is human activity (90% on average). Yet, the consequences of climate change are less consensual: an average 65% of respondents believe climate change to have a negative impact, with Brazil and Colombia showing the greatest disparity (56% and 75%, respectively). The sections below explore the factors driving these results.

Beliefs in the existence of climate change

Belief in climate change in Latin America is driven by psychological factors. The New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) is the chief determinant, echoing findings from other regions of the world.³³-³⁴ Yet, unlike it is the case elsewhere, an equally strong psychological predictor of belief in climate change in the region is perceived scientific consensus. In other words, the perception that the scientific community agrees that climate change is happening powerfully undergirds people’s belief that climate change is indeed real. Together, NEP and scientific consensus more than double the size of any other variable (Figure 1) across the majority of the countries surveyed (Supplementary Table 7).

FIGURE 1 [about here]

Other psychological antecedents matter too, albeit to lesser effect (Figure 1). For example, Latin Americans who have experienced extreme weather events tend to more strongly believe in climate change when compared to their co-nationals who have not.³⁵-³⁶ A stronger belief in climate change is also correlated with people’s greater objective and subjective knowledge, a finding that also resonates with data from other regions of the world.³⁷ Latin Americans who trust scientists in general or hold more egalitarian worldviews believe climate change is happening more than those who do not (as Supplementary Table 7 shows, however, these relationships are statistically significant but small in size and weakly consistent across countries). Contrary to existing theoretical intuitions in the literature, objective knowledge in Latin America is no more strongly correlated with belief in climate change than subjective knowledge.³⁸Also contrasting with previous research conducted elsewhere, we find that holding individualistic worldviews seems to have no significant effect on the belief in climate change among Latin Americans.³⁹

Findings from political and socio-demographic variables are somewhat surprising. In contrast to previous research,^40_41 we find that in Latin America political ideology (conservative-versus-progressive and left-versus-right) is only weakly associated with the belief in climate change (Figure 1). Although Latin Americans who self-identify as progressives tend to express less skepticism about the existence of climate change than their conservative co-nationals, findings are significant in only 2 of the 7 countries under study (Supplementary Table 7). Results also show that the left-right divide has no relationship with the belief in the existence of climate change, sharply contrasting with existing research conducted in Western countries.

By and large, socio-demographic variables are weakly associated with the perception that climate change is happening (Figure 1). For example, in contrast to data from other countries and regions,^42_43_44 we find no evidence that younger, more educated, higher-income, and female Latin Americans are less likely to be skeptical about the existence of climate change than their older, less educated, lower-income, and male co-nationals. These results hold regardless of estimation approach (Supplementary Tables 10, 11, and 12).

A surprising finding from this study pertains to the role of race in shaping public perceptions of climate change in Latin America. In 5 out of the 7 countries in the sample, black Latin Americans tend to be more skeptical about the reality of climate change than their non-black co-nationals. This finding runs in the opposite direction of previous studies based on other regions of the world.⁴⁵ We interpret it cautiously, however, because the association is statistically significant only in the case of Argentina (Supplementary Table 7), and hope future research will help clarify the dynamics at stake.

Belief in anthropogenic climate change

Figure 2 displays the main predictors of the belief that human activity is the major cause of climate change. As pointed out above, Latin Americans display a solid consensus as to the anthropogenic causes of climate change. This said, we find that individualistic worldviews engender significantly consistent correlations with this belief. Respondents who hold more individualistic values tend on average to be more skeptical about the reality of anthropogenic climate change (Supplementary Table 8). This result stands out for two reasons. First, it suggests that skepticism about the anthropogenic origins of climate change among Latin Americans might find fertile ground among social groups marked by highly individualistic values, where the sense of community that is at the heart of social capital is lacking. Second, our finding amends previous literatures that missed the systematic correlation between individualistic values and climate skepticism in Latin American societies.⁴⁶ The importance of other psychological variables is heterogeneous across our sample: although individuals ranking high on objective/subjective knowledge, endorsement of the NEP scale, scientific consensus, and trust in scientists are on average more likely to think that climate change is at least partly caused by human activity, estimates are weakly consistent across countries (Supplementary Table 8).

FIGURE 2 [about here].

We also find that the association between political orientation and climate skepticism is both weak and inconsistent across the region (Figure 2). Contrary to findings from the United States,⁴⁷-⁴⁸ Western Europe,⁴⁹ and other advanced economies,⁵⁰ right-leaning individuals in Latin America display no more skepticism about anthropogenic climate change than their left-leaning co-nationals. By the same token, the link between climate skepticism and conservatism (another proxy of political ideology) has no significant effect. These findings are particularly notable given the fact that they are consistent with scholarship from other non-Western regions and countries, including Central and Eastern Europe⁵¹-⁵² and China,⁵³ where political cleavages and divisions play only a minor role in explaining public perceptions about the anthropogenic origins of climate change. We discuss potential explanations below.

Furthermore, we find that the effects of demographic variables are by and large weakly consistent and not significant in shaping belief in anthropogenic climate change (Figure 2). The exception – albeit one that is weakly uniform across countries – is our finding that higher levels of education correlate with less skepticism as to the causal role of human activity in climate change (Supplementary Table 8). We find no effect for variables like age, gender, race, or income. This is particularly significant for gender, as our results contrast with findings of a gender gap around the globe⁵⁴ and in Africa in particular, where a recent meta-analysis shows that females are less climate-change literate than males.⁵⁵

Belief in the consequences of climate change

Among Latin Americans, the belief in the severity of climate change is far less consensual than the belief in its occurrence and in its human origins. The single most powerful psychological predictor of perceptions of the impact of climate change is individualistic values: consistent with the theoretical intuitions coming from Cultural Cognition theory,⁵⁶ people who score higher on individualistic values tend to see the impact of climate change to be less negative than their co-nationals who score lower on the same scale (Figure 3). The effect of this variable is significant, similar in size, and consistent across all participating countries (Supplementary Table 9), strongly suggesting that individualistic values shape public perceptions of climate impact across the region.

Somewhat surprisingly, perceptions of climate change impact among Latin Americans are weakly associated with political ideology (Figure 3). While results show that individuals on the left side are more likely to perceive the impact of climate change negatively than their peers on the right, these results are consistent in only 3 of the 7 countries in the sample (Supplementary Table 9). We find no association between conservative values and the perception that the impact of climate change is less severe. Overall, these findings stand in contrast to the widespread notion that individuals of a right-leaning and conservative political persuasion are more likely than those on the left and in the progressive camp to engage in motivated social cognition to minimize the perception of climate change impact (because of the threat posed by accepting the severity of climate change to their socio-economic status quo).⁵⁷-⁵⁸

FIGURE 3 [about here].

Objective knowledge is the next most consistent predictor of belief in the consequences of climate change.⁵⁹ The data show that the perception of more negative impacts of climate change is stronger the greater the level of objective knowledge, a result observed in 4 out of 7 countries in the sample (Supplementary Table 9). This finding speaks to the importance moving forward of crafting effective materials for climate change education among Latin Americans. The effects of other individual-level variables are more heterogeneous. For example, results are weakly consistent for the finding that endorsing the NEP scale and believing in scientific consensus predisposes individuals to perceive the impacts of climate change negatively (Supplementary Table 9). Subjective knowledge, personal experience with extreme weather events, trust in scientists, and egalitarianism values have no effect on the perception of the consequences of climate change (Figure 3).

Finally, two patterns emerge from the data concerning the association between perceptions of consequences of climate change and socio-demographic variables (Figure 3). First, education is the most consistent demographic correlate of perceived impacts of climate change. Individuals with higher levels of education (especially with post-secondary education), tend to be less doubtful about the negative impacts of climate change than their less educated peers, suggesting that level of education moderates the individual’s ability to concretize the effects of climate change (Supplementary Table 9). Second, other demographic variables such as age, gender, race, income, or religion have a relatively small effect or none at all. Although findings suggest that religious denominations such as Catholic, Evangelical Pentecostal and Evangelical traditional minimize the severity of climate change, one should be cautious in interpreting these results given that associations are only significant in a minority of countries (Supplementary Table 9).

This study collected a unique set of data to map the individual-level determinants of climate change perceptions across Latin America. Our findings shed new light onto region-specific dynamics involving citizen belief in the existence, the causes, and the consequences of climate change. Results also highlight risks and opportunities for pro-climate actors in the region, and provide valuable insight for all those committed to crafting public communication strategies that foster grass-root climate political mobilization in a part of the world that has seen too little of it.

We show that Latin America displays a solid social consensus around the existence of climate change and its human causes. To the extent that climate deniers and skeptics in the region are active today and in the future, they are unlikely to try to cast a shadow of doubt over the occurrence of phenomenon and its anthropogenic origins. Rather, these actors are more likely to emulate their peers elsewhere by questioning the severity of the consequences of climate change.- Unfortunately, our findings suggest Latin America may well be fertile ground for these types of cues. More specifically, our data show that the presence of individualistic values consistently predicts climate skepticism about the severity of climate change impact. While our research design does not allow us to identify why this should be the case, one plausible explanation has to do with the low levels of trust in political institutions and in interpersonal relationships that has been the hallmark of social life in Latin America. In a region sorely lacking in social capital – the network of relationships that allow a social group to coordinate individual action –, individualistic values abound. The fact that individuals who strongly hold individualistic values tend to process information and form attitudes with the goal of confirming their standing beliefs only makes the challenge of communicating the consequences of climate change to Latin Americans more intractable. It remains to be seen whether the deployment of counter cues and messages by pro-climate actors can effectively persuade motivated reasoners among mass publics without incurring the risk of backlash.-

Our results also highlight the role of perceived scientific consensus on climate change perceptions. While a recent meta-analysis of 56 countries indicates that perceived scientific consensus trails behind other predictors of belief in climate change, our findings from Latin America indicate that this psychological variable is the strongest and most consistent predictor that climate change is happening across the region. A potential explanation for this finding is that in the low-trust societies of Latin America, the perception of consensus among the community of scientists might be in itself reassuring. The perceived coalescence of multiple authoritative experts around one shared conclusion might counterbalance individual-level doubts as to the credibility of climate institutions. Supporting this interpretation is the fact that we find no parallel effect for individual-level trust in scientists, a related science-based heuristic that the same meta-analysis shows to have similar effects to scientific consensus on shaping belief in climate change elsewhere. Once again, it might be the case that generally distrusting individuals in the public find consensus among scientists to be more concrete evidence of the veracity of climate change than the abstract notion of general trust in scientists. Be as it may, these results are a good omen for the prospects of climate action in the region, given existing evidence that people who believe that scientists agree on climate change tend to be more supportive of societal action to limit it.

Another important finding from this study is that, in sharp contrast to advanced Western democracies, political ideology in Latin America does not reliably predict climate change perceptions. This result concurs with other studies suggesting non-significant effects of political ideology in settings where polarization around climate change is low. This situation might not last long if the recurrence of extreme weather events in the region in the near future ends up polarizing domestic political debates about climate change. At least as of writing, however, it opens up the possibility of pro-climate action across ideological boundaries and political party lines. Additional work should experimentally manipulate different levels of political polarization over climate change in countries in the region to determine whether the salience of different political ideologies might affect climate change beliefs.

Other theorized predictors of belief in climate change have a more variable influence in this study. For example, there is wide country variation on the effects of knowledge (objective and subjective) and personal experience with extreme weather events on climate change perceptions. This suggests that countries have unique sets of predictors of climate change beliefs, a finding in line with existing multi-country studies on the topic.- Future work should explore the contextual factors that shape the differences in individual-level effects and interact them with country-level conditions to see what may explain these variations.

Furthermore, our finding that socio-demographic factors have small associations with public perceptions of climate change stands in sharp contrast to recent work conducted elswhere showing that demographics can be central factors influencing climate change perceptions.^_^_ It also raises questions as to whether the importance of these variables might be conditional on country-level or region-level factors. One could suspect these results are driven by the fact that this study does not use national representative samples (see Methods), but other works in Latin America using such samples have also found inconsistent relationships between demographics and climate change beliefs. Additional research is needed to explain this trend.

Finally, this study is not without limitations. Given its cross-sectional and exploratory nature, we cannot isolate causal effects or discard potentially endogenous relationships between variables. Future experimental and longitudinal analysis could provide an effective remedy to this problem, exploring the causal effects of the main results found here. Additional work should explore in particular why individualistic values play such a powerful role in shaping Latin American perceptions of climate change: while our findings echo existing theoretical expectations in the expert literature and help amend previous empirical research in the region, we need a better account as to why these effects occur. In addition, while this study tested several key socio-demographic and psychological determinants of climate change perceptions, the list is certainly not exhaustive, as other important factors such as human values, risk perception, and trust can potentially shape climate change perceptions. Another limitation is that our design does not capture spatial variations within the countries under study at the state and local levels, effacing potentially diverse political geographies. Future work could provide a remedy by deploying small-area estimation methods to map geographical variation.

Last but not least, future research should take the next step and explore the relationship between climate change perceptions and climate behavior. Scholars have begun to establish how climate change beliefs connect to mitigation and adaptation,- but it remains to be seen if these relationships hold in the Global South in general and in Latin America in particular. Armed with a clearer understanding of the determinants of beliefs in climate change, the community of pro-climate players in and around Latin America will be better equipped to tackle these urgent matters.

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Participants. This study uses survey data collected by the Netquest polling company between October and November 2021. We targeted respondents from 7 countries in Latin America (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Mexico) representing over 80% of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in the region. The survey was conducted with nationally diverse samples of these countries using online panels of respondents. Netquest builds its online panels through an opt-in recruitment method, where respondents are randomly selected for survey invitation, using population quotas to produce nationally diverse samples. Netquest is certified with ISO 26362, an international high-quality standard for online panels, and complies with the European Society for Opinion and Market Research (ESOMAR). In general, this means that Netquest engages in a number of quality control steps, including the exclusion of speeders or preventing duplicate responders. Additional information on data quality and sampling is available in Netquest technical information reports.

We chose Netquest because it provides comprehensive national panels in Latin America, which allow us to relatively approximate the national representativeness of the participating countries. In this study, respondents were recruited to match the demographic composition, particularly of gender, age, and education, laid out by the national census of each country surveyed. The final sample comprises 5.400 participants, with all respondents above 18 years of age. Each country surveyed had roughly 830 respondents. The only exception was Ecuador, where just 421 respondents were interviewed due to panel coverage constraints. For demographic information broken for each of the countries, see Supplementary Table 1. Overall, the sample of each country is balanced with respect to gender, approximating closely to their respective official statistics. Moreover, one main concern of online samples is that their respondents tend to be more educated than the general population, a tendency that can be exacerbated in low and middle-income countries. In general terms, our sample is well-distributed in terms of education, with the overrepresentation of educated participants more pronounced in Ecuador and Peru (Supplementary Table 1). However, even when we controlled for education the overall interpretation of our results remained unaltered. Finally, our country samples are all broadly diverse in other important demographic indicators, including race, religion, and socio-economic status (Supplementary Table 1), which are known to correlate with important dimensions of climate change perceptions.

Materials. Questionnaires were first elaborated in Portuguese and then translated into Spanish by a native speaker and taking into account translation/back-translation procedures. Concerns about comprehension and translatability were addressed by testing and piloting of questionnaires in all seven countries contemplated in the survey.

Dependent measures (climate change perceptions). Building on previous research, we measure climate change beliefs by focusing on the critical dimensions of its existence, its causes, and its consequences.- To measure the belief about the existence of climate change- participants were asked, “You may have heard the idea that the world’s climate is changing due to increases in average temperatures over the past 150 years. What’s your personal opinion on this? Do you think that the world’s climate is changing?” Respondents could then choose one of the following responses: “Yes (1), No (0), Don’t know.” Respondents who answered “yes” or “no” were then asked: “How sure are you that climate change is [not] happening?” (0 = not sure at all, 3 = extremely sure). Responses to these questions were recoded to create an eight-point certainty scale (0 = extremely sure global warming is not happening, 4 = don’t know, 8 = extremely sure global warming is happening). The belief about the causes of climate change was assessed with the question, “Assuming climate change is happening, do you think it is….” Respondents selected one of the four options: “Caused mostly by human activities, Caused by human activities and natural changes, Caused mostly by natural changes in the environment, Neither because global warming isn’t happening.” Following standard practice, respondents who answered “caused mostly by human activities” were coded as 1, while all others as 0.^_ Finally, we measure the perception of the impacts of climate change with the standard question used in the literature: “How good or bad do you think the impact of climate change will be on people across the world?” The question was measured using an 11-point scale, ranging from 0 (extremely bad) to 10 (extremely good).

Independent variables

Psychological variables

Knowledge about climate change was measured using one question that embraces participants’ subjective perception of their own expertise (subjective knowledge), and another that focuses on respondents’ knowledge about the human causes of climate change (objective knowledge). We measured subjective knowledge by asking respondents the following question: “How much do you feel you know about climate change?” Participants rated their perceived amount of knowledge on a four-point scale (1 = nothing, 2 = a little, 3 = a moderate amount, 4 = a lot) but with a fifth option for people who “don’t know”. Objective knowledge was measured by asking participants, “Indicate whether you think each of the following is a major cause of climate change, or not a cause at all.” Six items were adopted from Guy et al., which include three true causes (“Pollution/emissions from business and industry”, “People driving their cars”, “Destruction of tropical forests”) and three false causes (“Use of aerosol spray cans”, “Use of chemicals to destroy insect pests”, and “Nuclear power generation”). Responses of items were coded as correct (1) or incorrect (0) and summed to create a total score ranging from 0 to 6.

Beliefs about science were measured through a question about scientific consensus around climate change (“consensus heuristic”), and another about trust in scientists (“source heuristic”). These two measures comprise the two main heuristics about science and climate change that have been implicated in the existing literature. In the case of scientific consensus about climate change, participants were asked, “Which comes closest to your own view?” The response options were: “Most scientists think global warming is happening”, “A lot of disagreement among scientists about whether or not global warming is happening”, “Most scientists think global warming is not happening”, and “I do not know enough to say.” Respondents who answered “Most scientists think global warming is happening” were coded as 1, and all other answers as 0. We measured trust in scientists by asking, “How much do you trust scientists as a source of information about climate change?” Participants rate their level of trust on a four-point scale (1 = strongly distrust; 4 = strongly trust).

Environmental values. To measure environmental values, we use a 4-item revised version from the New Ecological Paradigm scale based on previous research. The items include “Humans are severely abusing the environment”, “The so-called ‘ecological crisis’ facing humankind has been greatly exaggerated”, “The earth is like a spaceship with very limited room and resources”, and “If things continue on their present course, we will soon experience a major ecological catastrophe.” Items were responded to on a four-point scale (1 = strongly disagree; 4 = strongly agree). There was also a fifth option for people who “don’t know”. The participants who chose the “don’t know” option were treated as missing values on this scale. The NEP scale was constructed by taking the mean scores across these 4 items. The original scale showed poor internal reliability across the whole sample (α = 0.37), which a closer analysis revealed to be driven by the answers to the second item, “The so-called ‘ecological crisis’ facing humankind has been greatly exaggerated”. Consequently, we conducted the analyses just on the three positively worded items, which provides an improved reliability on the scale. However, this measure continues to carry limitations, given its alpha (0.53) did not exceed the conventional 0.60 criteria. While it is common that the reliability of psychological measures may be lower in the non-Westerners contexts, we suggest caution in interpreting the results based on the NEP scale.

Cultural worldviews. Values were measured using the individualism and egalitarianism cultural worldviews derived from cultural cognition theory. We operationalized Individualism worldview scale with 5 items based on previous studies. Items include “If the government spent less time trying to fix everyone’s problems, we’d all be a lot better off”, “Our government tries to do too many things for too many people. We should just let people take care of themselves”, “The government interferes too much in our everyday lives”, “Government regulation of business usually does more harm than good”, and “People should be allowed to make as much money as they can, even if it means some make millions while others live in poverty.” All items were responded to a four point-scale (1 = strongly disagree; 4 = strongly agree). The individualism scale is constructed by taking the mean scores across these 5 items, which together showed acceptable internal reliability (α = 0.67). Note that the individualism scale has been reported in other studies in the Global South with similar internal consistency, underscoring the reliability of this measure in our study.

Egalitarianism worldview is also a composite measure with 5 items. Items include: “The world would be a more peaceful place if its wealth were divided more equally among nations,” “In my ideal society, all basic needs (food, housing, health care, education) would be guaranteed by the government for everyone,” “I support government programs to get rid of poverty,” “Discrimination against minorities is still a very serious problem in our society.” All items were responded to a four point-scale (1 = strongly disagree; 4 = strongly agree). As in the case of the individualism scale, the scale of egalitarianism was created by taking the mean scores across these 5 items. The scale showed relatively strong internal reliability across the overall sample (α = 0.72).

Personal experience with extreme weather events. This measure was assessed by asking respondents to recall how often in the last five years they experienced extreme weather events (e.g., severe heat waves, droughts, freak storms, flooding etc.) while residing in their home country. Following previous studies, items were measured on a five-point scale (1 = never, 2 = once, 3 = twice, 4 = more than three, 5 = can’t remember) and responses were combined and dichotomized to form a dummy describing personal experience (0 = no experience, 1 = experience).

Political ideology variables. Political ideology was measured using two different questions. First, respondents were asked to rate how right or left they are on a ten-point scale (1 = left, 10 = right). Second, respondents were asked to choose the option that better characterizes their political values in a conservative-progressive dimension. The response options were rated on a five-point scale (1 = very progressive, 5 = very conservative). We opted to use the word “progressive” rather than “liberal” because “liberal” in Latin America can be associated with the orthodox economic policy preferences of the political right. “Progressive” (progresista in Spanish or progressista in Portuguese) provides a better characterization of what the existing literature labels as “liberal” in this context.

Socio-Demographics variables. The demographic variables include gender (binary: male or female), age (in years), education level (ordinal: elementary (primary) or less; high school or equivalent; and undergraduate or more), religion (Evangelical Christian/Traditional; Evangelical Protestant; Evangelical Pentecostal; Evangelical Neo-Pentecostal; Other Evangelical denominations; Catholic; Kardecist/Spiritualist; Jewish; Agnostic; Atheist; Other Religion.), race (White; Black or Pardo); Indigenous; Other. In all countries (except for Brazil), we also include “Mestizo” as an option choice, given that it is a racial classification present in these countries), income-based on minimum wages (from 1 to 10 minimum wages or more).

Statistical Analysis

To evaluate what factors determine climate change beliefs in Latin America we estimated the following equation by ordinary least squares for each country and our whole sample:

$${y}_{i}= {\beta }_{0}+ {Psychological Variables}_{i}^{{\prime }}\gamma + {Political Ideology Variables}_{i}^{{\prime }}\alpha +{SocioDemographic Variables}_{i}^{{\prime }}\mu +{\epsilon }_{i}$$

where ${y}_{i}$ is one of our three dependent variables (belief about the existence of climate change, belief about the causes of climate change, and perception about the impacts of climate change) for individual $i$; ${Psychological Variables}_{i}$ is a vector of eight psychological variables of individual $i$; $Political Ideology Variables$ is a vector of two political ideology variables of individual $i$; and ${SocioDemographic Variables}_{i}$ is a vector of six population-related characteristics of individual $i$. Reference baseline for education is “elementary (primary) or less”, for religion is “atheist” and for income is “0–1 minimum wages”. Standard errors presented in the results are robust to heteroscedasticity and all estimations include sample weights.

For belief about the existence of climate change, the vector of parameters of interest, $\gamma ,$ $\alpha$ and $\mu$, can be interpreted as changes in the climate change belief scale (0–8) given a unit increase in the covariates. For belief about the causes of climate change, each parameter of the vectors $\gamma ,$ $\alpha$ and $\mu$ multiplied by one hundred can be interpreted as percentage point changes in the probability of believing climate change is mainly caused by human activity given a unit increase in the binary covariates. For perception about the impacts of climate change, $\gamma ,$ $\alpha$ and $\mu$ multiplied by one hundred can be interpreted as percentage point changes in the probability of believing climate change impacts will be negative given a unit increase in the binary covariates.

To gauge the robustness of our ordinary least squares estimates we performed several tests by employing alternative methods to estimate the parameters of our main equation. First, we estimated three multilevel (hierarchical) models, one for each dependent variable, with a random intercept specified at the country-level (Supplementary Table 10). Second, we estimated three fixed-effects models, one for each dependent variable, by including country-level effects (Supplementary Table 11). Both of these approaches allow us to control for possible time-invariant unobserved heterogeneity between respondents of each country. Third, we used an ordinal logistic model to regress belief about the existence of climate change on the three vectors of predictors (Supplementary Table 12). Finally, we estimated two binary logistics models regressing the belief about the causes of climate change and perception about the impacts of climate change also on the three vectors (Supplementary Tables 13 and 14). Overall, the results are substantially similar irrespective of the alternative specifications of our main equation.

Ethics Statement

This study was approved by the Ethical Review Committee of the Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV) (Ethics no. 053/2021). All participants informed voluntary consent with an IRB-approved consent protocol before being allowed to proceed to the full questionnaire. The survey did not collect identifying information about respondents and/or use any type of deception. The panel provider modestly compensated the respondents with points they accumulate and then exchange for goods or cellphone minutes.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Determinants of Climate Change Beliefs in Latin America

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