Topline
Less than half of Americans believe the Earth is warming as a direct result of human activity, new data from Pew Research shows, and 12% of Americans don’t believe the Earth is warming at all.
A man on a rooftop looks at approaching flames of the Springs fire on May 3, 2013 near Camarillo, California.
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Key Facts
Pew released new data Thursday that shows only 48% of Americans believe climate change is the result of human activity—a view shared by a vast majority of scientists—and fewer people believe it now than when the same question was asked in 2019 and 2022.
The latest data shows 22% of people believe the warming of the Earth is due to natural climate patterns, 17% say they aren’t sure what’s causing it and 12% say they don’t think there’s solid evidence the Earth is warming at all.
Most Democrats (75%) who responded to the Pew survey said climate change is the result of human activity, while Republicans had much more varied views: 21% said it was because of human activity, 37% said it was a naturally occurring phenomena, 19% said they aren’t sure and 23% don’t think evidence supports the warming of the Earth.
The Pew survey also found that the more educated a person was, the more likely they were to believe climate change is the fault of humans—62% of people with post-graduate college education believe humans are causing the Earth to warm, while only 56% of college graduates felt the same, 45% of people with some college education believe it and only 40% of people with high school diplomas or less education think humans are at fault.
The majority of Americans (68%) do concede that extreme weather events are happening more often in the U.S., though Democrats (85%) are almost twice as likely to believe it than Republicans.
Tangent
Pew asked survey respondents if they engage in any of five environmentally friendly behaviors: turning off the lights when no one is home, recycling, limiting home water use, buying clothes or other goods secondhand, and carpooling. Almost everyone said they did at least one activity, most commonly turning off the lights when no one is using them (95%), but they said they don’t do it to help the environment—they do it to save money.
Big Number
About two-thirds. That’s how many Americans say they regularly recycle. Most said they do it to help the environment (76%) and about one-in-five said they recycle because it’s required where they live.
Key Background
The vast majority of active climate scientists (97%) agree that humans are causing global warming and climate change, according to NASA. The Environmental Protection Agency says there are multiple lines of evidence showing changes in temperature and precipitation patterns; increases in ocean temperature, sea level and acidity; melting glaciers and sea ice; more frequent and extreme weather events; and changes to ecosystem patterns, like the length of the growing season and migration of birds. Those changes are caused by a buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the subsequent warming of the planet due to the greenhouse effect, according to the EPA, much of which is driven by human behavior. Humans create greenhouse gases by burning fossil fuels for heat and energy, clearing forests, fertilizing crops, storing waste in landfills, raising livestock, manufacturing industrial products and dozens of other behaviors that introduce more carbon into the atmosphere.