Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world

TISP Consortium; Viktoria Cologna; Simon Meiler; Chahan M. Kropf; Samuel Lüthi; Niels G. Mede; David N. Bresch; Oscar Lecuona; Sebastian Berger; John  Besley; Cameron Brick; Marina Joubert; Edward W. Maibach; Sabina Mihelj; Naomi  Oreskes; Mike S. Schäfer; Sander  Van der Linden

doi:10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4

Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world

TISP Consortium, Viktoria Cologna, Simon Meiler, Chahan M. Kropf, Samuel Lüthi, Niels G. Mede, David N. Bresch, Oscar Lecuona, Sebastian Berger, John Besley, Cameron Brick, Marina Joubert, Edward W. Maibach, Sabina Mihelj, Naomi Oreskes, Mike S. Schäfer, Sander Van der Linden

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change. Yet, little is known about the relationship between exposure to extreme events, subjective attribution of these events to climate change, and climate policy support, especially in the Global South. Combining large-scale natural and social science data from 68 countries (N = 71,922), we develop a measure of exposed population to extreme weather events and investigate whether exposure to extreme weather and subjective attribution of extreme weather to climate change predict climate policy support. We find that most people support climate policies and link extreme weather events to climate change. Subjective attribution of extreme weather was positively associated with policy support for five widely discussed climate policies. However, exposure to most types of extreme weather event did not predict policy support. Overall, these results suggest that subjective attribution could facilitate climate policy support.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	725-735
Number of pages	11
Journal	Nature Climate Change
Volume	15
Issue number	7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4
Publication status	Published - 1 Jul 2025

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© The Author(s) 2025.

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TISP Consortium, Cologna, V., Meiler, S., M. Kropf, C., Lüthi, S., Mede, N. G., Bresch, D. N., Lecuona, O., Berger, S., Besley, J., Brick, C., Joubert, M., Maibach, E. W., Mihelj, S., Oreskes, N., Schäfer, M. S., & Van der Linden, S. (2025). Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world. Nature Climate Change, 15(7), 725-735. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4

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title = "Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world",

abstract = "Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change. Yet, little is known about the relationship between exposure to extreme events, subjective attribution of these events to climate change, and climate policy support, especially in the Global South. Combining large-scale natural and social science data from 68 countries (N = 71,922), we develop a measure of exposed population to extreme weather events and investigate whether exposure to extreme weather and subjective attribution of extreme weather to climate change predict climate policy support. We find that most people support climate policies and link extreme weather events to climate change. Subjective attribution of extreme weather was positively associated with policy support for five widely discussed climate policies. However, exposure to most types of extreme weather event did not predict policy support. Overall, these results suggest that subjective attribution could facilitate climate policy support.",

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note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} The Author(s) 2025.",

year = "2025",

month = jul,

day = "1",

doi = "10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4",

language = "English",

volume = "15",

pages = "725--735",

journal = "Nature Climate Change",

issn = "1758-678X",

publisher = "Macmillan",

number = "7",

}

TISP Consortium, Cologna, V, Meiler, S, M. Kropf, C, Lüthi, S, Mede, NG, Bresch, DN, Lecuona, O, Berger, S, Besley, J, Brick, C, Joubert, M, Maibach, EW, Mihelj, S, Oreskes, N, Schäfer, MS & Van der Linden, S 2025, 'Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world', Nature Climate Change, vol. 15, no. 7, pp. 725-735. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4

TY - JOUR

T1 - Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world

AU - TISP Consortium

AU - Cologna, Viktoria

AU - Meiler, Simon

AU - M. Kropf, Chahan

AU - Lüthi, Samuel

AU - Mede, Niels G.

AU - Bresch, David N.

AU - Lecuona, Oscar

AU - Berger, Sebastian

AU - Besley, John

AU - Brick, Cameron

AU - Joubert, Marina

AU - Maibach, Edward W.

AU - Mihelj, Sabina

AU - Oreskes, Naomi

AU - Schäfer, Mike S.

AU - Van der Linden, Sander

A2 - Abdul Aziz, Nor Izzatina

A2 - Abdulsalam, Suleiman

A2 - Abu Shamsi, Nurulaini

A2 - Aczel, Balazs

A2 - Adinugroho, Indro

A2 - Alabrese, Eleonora

A2 - Aldoh, Alaa

A2 - Alfano, Mark

A2 - Ali, Innocent Mbulli

A2 - Alsobay, Mohammed

A2 - Alvarez, R. Michael

A2 - Amollo, Tabitha

A2 - Ansah, Patrick

A2 - Apriliawati, Denisa

A2 - Azevedo, Flavio

A2 - Bajrami, Ani

A2 - Bardhan, Ronita

A2 - Bati, Keagile

A2 - Bertsou, Eri

A2 - Bhui, Rahul

A2 - Białobrzeska, Olga

A2 - Bilewicz, Michal

A2 - Bouguettaya, Ayoub

A2 - Breeden, Katherine

A2 - Bret, Amélie

A2 - Buchel, Ondrej

A2 - Cabrera-Álvarez, Pablo

A2 - Cagnoli, Federica

A2 - Valdez, André Calero

A2 - Callaghan, Timothy

A2 - Cases, Rizza Kaye Cases

A2 - Çoksan, Sami

A2 - Czarnek, Gabriela

A2 - Debnath, Ramit

A2 - Delouvée, Sylvain

A2 - De Stefano, Lucia

A2 - Díaz-Catalán, Celia

A2 - Doell, Kimberly C.

A2 - Dohle, Simone

A2 - Douglas, Karen M.

A2 - Dries, Charlotte

A2 - Dubrov, Dmitrii

A2 - Dzimińska, Małgorzata

A2 - Ecker, Ullrich K. H.

A2 - Elbaek, Christian T.

A2 - Elsherif, Mahmoud

A2 - Enke, Benjamin

A2 - Facciani, Matthew

A2 - Fage-Butler, Antoinette

A2 - Faisal, Md. Zaki

A2 - Fan, Xiaoli

A2 - Farhart, Christina

A2 - Feldhaus, Christoph

A2 - Ferreira, Marinus

A2 - Feuerriegel, Stefan

A2 - Fischer, Helen

A2 - Freundt, Jana

A2 - Friese, Malte

A2 - Gallyamova, Albina

A2 - Garrido-Vásquez, Patricia

A2 - Vásquez, Mauricio E. Garrido

A2 - Genschow, Olivier

A2 - Ghasemi, Omid

A2 - Gkinopoulos, Theofilos

A2 - Gloor, Jamie L.

A2 - Goddard, Ellen

A2 - González-Brambila, Claudia

A2 - Gordon, Hazel

A2 - Grigoryev, Dmitry

A2 - Guenther, Lars

A2 - Haarstad, Håvard

A2 - Harari, Dana

A2 - Hensel, Przemysław

A2 - Hernández-Mondragón, Alma Cristal

A2 - Herziger, Atar

A2 - Huang, Guanxiong

A2 - Huff, Markus

A2 - Hurley, Mairéad

A2 - Ibadildin, Nygmet

A2 - Tarikul Islam, Mohammad

A2 - Jin, Tao

A2 - Jones,, Charlotte A.

A2 - Jungkunz, Sebastian

A2 - Jurgiel, Dominika

A2 - Kavassalis, Sarah

A2 - Kerr, John R.

A2 - Kitsa, Mariana

A2 - Klabíková Rábová, Tereza

A2 - Klein, Olivier

A2 - Koh, Hoyoun

A2 - Koivula, Aki

A2 - Kojan, Lilian

A2 - Komyaginskaya, Elizaveta

A2 - König, Laura M.

A2 - Koppel, Lina

A2 - Koren, Kochav

A2 - Kosachenko, Alexandra

A2 - Kotcher, John

A2 - Kranz, Laura S.

A2 - Krishnan, Pradeep

A2 - Kristiansen, Silje

A2 - Krouwel, André

A2 - Kuppens, Toon

A2 - Lamm, Claus

A2 - Lantian, Anthony

A2 - Lazić, Aleksandra

A2 - Légal, Jean-Baptiste

A2 - Leviston, Zoe

A2 - Levy, Neil

A2 - Lindkvist, Amanda M.

A2 - Lits, Grégoire

A2 - Löschel, Andreas

A2 - Ortega, Alberto López

A2 - Lopez-Villavicencio, Carlos

A2 - Lou, Nigel Mantou

A2 - Lucas, Chloe H.

A2 - Lunz-Trujillo, Kristin

A2 - Marques, Mathew D.

A2 - Mayer, Sabrina J.

A2 - McKay, Ryan

A2 - Milfont, Taciano L.

A2 - Miller, Joanne M.

A2 - Mitkidis, Panagiotis

A2 - Monge-Rodríguez, Fredy

A2 - Motta, Matt

A2 - Muršič, Zarja

A2 - Namutebi, Jennifer

A2 - Newman, Eryn J.

A2 - Nitschke, Jonas P.

A2 - Ntui, Ntui-Njock Vincent

A2 - Nwogwugwu, Daniel

A2 - Ostermann, Thomas

A2 - Otterbring, Tobias

A2 - Pantazi, Myrto

A2 - Pärnamets, Philip

A2 - Saiani, Paolo Parra

A2 - Paruzel-Czachura, Mariola

A2 - Parzuchowski, Michal

A2 - Pavlov, Yuri G.

A2 - Pearson, Adam R.

A2 - Pennington, Charlotte R.

A2 - Petkanopoulou, Katerina

A2 - Petrović, Marija B.

A2 - Pisareva, Dinara

A2 - Ploszaj, Adam

A2 - Pronizius, Ekaterina

A2 - Pštross, Karolína

A2 - Pypno-Blajda, Katarzyna

A2 - Quiñones, Diwa Malaya A.

A2 - Räsänen, Pekka

A2 - Rauchfleisch, Adrian

A2 - Rebitschek, Felix G.

A2 - Rêgo, Gabriel

A2 - Reynolds, James P.

A2 - Roche, Joseph

A2 - Röer, Jan Philipp

A2 - Ross, Robert M.

A2 - Ruin, Isabelle

A2 - Santos, Osvaldo

A2 - Santos, Ricardo R.

A2 - Schulreich, Stefan

A2 - Shuckburgh, Emily

A2 - Six, Johan

A2 - Solak, Nevin

A2 - Späth, Leonhard

A2 - Spruyt, Bram

A2 - Stanley, Samantha K.

A2 - Strahm, Noel

A2 - Syropoulos, Stylianos

A2 - Szaszi, Barnabas

A2 - Szumowska, Ewa

A2 - Tanaka, Mikihito

A2 - Teran-Escobar, Claudia

A2 - Todorova, Boryana

A2 - Kafid Toko, Abdoul

A2 - Tokrri, Renata

A2 - Toribio-Florez, Daniel

A2 - Tsakiris, Manos

A2 - Tyrala, Michael

A2 - Melis Uluğ, Özden

A2 - Chinwe Uzoma, Ijeoma

A2 - van Noord, Jochem

A2 - Vilares, Iris

A2 - Vlasceanu, Madalina

A2 - von Bubnoff, Andreas

A2 - Warwas, Izabela

A2 - Weninger, Tim

A2 - Westfal, Mareike

A2 - Wojcik, Adrian Dominik

A2 - Xia, Ziqian

A2 - Xie, Jinliang

A2 - Zegler-Poleska, Ewa

A2 - Zenklusen, Amber

PY - 2025/7/1

Y1 - 2025/7/1

N2 - Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change. Yet, little is known about the relationship between exposure to extreme events, subjective attribution of these events to climate change, and climate policy support, especially in the Global South. Combining large-scale natural and social science data from 68 countries (N = 71,922), we develop a measure of exposed population to extreme weather events and investigate whether exposure to extreme weather and subjective attribution of extreme weather to climate change predict climate policy support. We find that most people support climate policies and link extreme weather events to climate change. Subjective attribution of extreme weather was positively associated with policy support for five widely discussed climate policies. However, exposure to most types of extreme weather event did not predict policy support. Overall, these results suggest that subjective attribution could facilitate climate policy support.

AB - Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change. Yet, little is known about the relationship between exposure to extreme events, subjective attribution of these events to climate change, and climate policy support, especially in the Global South. Combining large-scale natural and social science data from 68 countries (N = 71,922), we develop a measure of exposed population to extreme weather events and investigate whether exposure to extreme weather and subjective attribution of extreme weather to climate change predict climate policy support. We find that most people support climate policies and link extreme weather events to climate change. Subjective attribution of extreme weather was positively associated with policy support for five widely discussed climate policies. However, exposure to most types of extreme weather event did not predict policy support. Overall, these results suggest that subjective attribution could facilitate climate policy support.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=105025036530&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4

DO - 10.1038/s41558-025-02372-4

M3 - Article

C2 - 40641510

SN - 1758-678X

VL - 15

SP - 725

EP - 735

JO - Nature Climate Change

JF - Nature Climate Change

IS - 7

ER -

Extreme weather event attribution predicts climate policy support across the world

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