How do Americans think about climate change and what to do about it? Using a new approach to tracking public opinion, Robert Brulle and co-author J. Craig Jenkins of Ohio State University show that partisan debates have an outsized influence on public attitudes.

Read the full Brulle-Jenkins brief here, and see the discussion of this research at the blogsite Wired Science, "Americans Listening to Politicians, Not Climate Scientists."

Learn more about Robert Brulle and Craig Jenkins and the work they have done on the environment and the politics of climate change. Jenkins directs the Mershon Center for International Security Studies at Ohio State.

In related research, SSN scholar Frederick W. Mayer of the Sanford School at Duke University looks at the role of competing media narratives in shaping changes in public opinion about climate change.

Jacobs is the Director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. To learn more about the activities of his center, click here.