Fear Appeal And Efficacy Information Type:A Study On The Effects Of Climate Communication

Focusing on the effects of climate communication,this study focuses on 3 central research questions.The first is:Does the fear appeal information emphasizing the harmful consequences have a positive effect on the public’s pro-environmental behavioral intentions?The second is:Does the information about the effectiveness of mitigation measures have a positive effect on the public’s pro-environmental behavioral intentions?The third is:Through what mechanism do the climate communication framework of fear appeal and efficiency information have an impact on the public’s pro-environmental behavioral intentions?They are then further refined into 7 research hypotheses.Using the investigation-experiment research method,this study designed 9 experimental information groups with 3(fear appeal level)×3(efficacy information type),and finally collected 281 valid samples.The results of this study are as follows:First,the communication strategy of fear appeal has limited effect and cannot have a significant impact on the motivation of the audience directly,but fear appeal can indirectly affect the protection motivation through the emotion of guilt.Second,the national efficacy information and personal efficacy information,both can make the audience have a higher protection motivation than the national efficacy information.In addition,there is an interaction between efficacy information and fear appeal on the protective motivation.Third,there is more than one path on the influence of the efficacy information to protective motivation and defensive motivation.The mediation of incentive perception of emotions in the influence of the efficacy information to protective motivation and credibility are completely mediating role,while severity perception on the influence of the performance information to protective motivation exists partial intermediary role,and operational effectiveness in the efficacy information to protective motivation exists on the influence of the intermediary role completely.