Climatechange vs. #Globalwarming

Characterizing Two Competing Climate Discourses on Twitter with Semantic Network and Temporal Analyses

Datos Bibliográficos

ID17801031
AutoresWen Shi (0000-0003-1022-6639, Tsinghua University, autor de correspondencia), Haohuan Fu (0000-0002-6982-2235, National Supercomputing Center in Wuxi), Peinan Wang (0000-0001-6590-0454, Tsinghua University), Wang Pei-nan (Tsinghua University), Changfeng Chen (0000-0002-6110-1118, Tsinghua University), Jie Xiong (0000-0002-7126-0884, École Supérieure de Commerce de Rennes)
Año2020
Volumen17
Número3
Páginas1062-1062
Fecha de publicación2020-02-07
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaInternational Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1661-7827 • E-ISSN: 1660-4601
EditorialMultidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (PUBLISHER • CH)
DOI10.3390/ijerph17031062
PMID32046166
OpenAlexW3004748085
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas10
Referencias citadas75

Distinct perceptions of the global climate is one of the factors preventing society from achieving consensus or taking collaborative actions on this issue. The public has not even reached an agreement on the naming of the global concern, showing preference for either "climate change" or "global warming", and few previous studies have addressed these two competing discourses resulting from distinct climate concerns by differently linking numerous climate concepts. Based on the 6,662,478 tweets containing #climatechange or #globalwarming generated between 1 January 2009 and 31 December 2018, we constructed the semantic networks of the two discourses and examined their evolution over the decade. The findings indicate that climate change demonstrated a more scientific perspective and showed an attempt to condense climate discussions rather than diffuse the topic by frequently addressing sub-topics simultaneously. Global warming triggered more political responses and showed a greater connection with phenomena. Temporal analysis suggests that traditional political discussions were gradually fading in both discourses but more recently started to revive in the form of discourse alliance in the climate change discourse. The associations between global warming and weather abnormalitiessuddenly strengthened around 2012. Climate change is becoming more dominant than global warming in public discussions. Although two discourses have shown more similarities in the rank order of important climate concepts, apparent disagreements continue about how these concepts are associated. These findings lay the groundwork for researchers and communicators to narrow the discrepancy between diverse climate perceptions

Alliance · Climate change · Global warming · Perception · Political science · Politics · Preference · Scientific consensus · Climate Change Communication and Perception · Computer Science · Law · Media Studies and Communication · Psychology · Public Relations and Crisis Communication · Ecology