As delegates gather in Copenhagen for the UN climate summit, a new poll shows growing concern for climate change; nearly two-thirds say climate is "very serious" problem.
Despite the fact that recent polling numbers indicate a decrease in public concern for climate change in the United States, global concern is at its highest level since 1998, according to a new poll released on Monday.
According to the GlobeScan/BBC World Service poll, nearly two-thirds of people now consider climate change is a “very serious” problem. This year's results indicate the greatest overall concern for the climate since GlobeScan began international tracking in 1998.
"The poll shows strong worldwide support for action on climate change, in spite of the recession," said GlobeScan chairman Doug Miller.
The poll was conducted between June and October and represents the opinions of of over 27,000 citizens in 23 countries. GlobeScan has regularly polled 13 of the countries included in the survey, for the past 11 years.
But concern about the climate in the world's two biggest carbon-emitting countries, China and the Unites States, has actually fallen. The percentage of American (45%) and Chinese citizens (57%) who see climate change as “very serious” is well below the 23-country average of 64 percent.
And while 89% of Chinese support government investments to address climate change even if these harm the economy only roughly one-half of Americans feel the same way.
One of the most remarkable findings of the GlobeScan poll was that despite the fact that only 57% of Chinese people questioned said climate change was a very serious concern, 89% of them supported government investment in tackling climate change - a figure higher than in any other country.
The news comes as the results of a separate poll, the Nielsen/Oxford University survey, also just released, showed a much different picture. Nielsen/Oxford found waning concern for the climate with only 37 percent of more than 27,000 Internet users in 54 countries saying they were "very concerned" about climate change, down from 41 percent in a similar poll two years ago.
The wide disparity in results between the two polls could perhaps be explained by the different methodologies employed, or even by the difference between "very serious" and "very concerned". Taken together, the two polls do show us at least one thing: public opinion researchers really don't have a good grip on public attitudes toward global warming,