A new study shows that, despite fires, floods and record heat, most Australians do not change their behaviour or beliefs in response to climate change – except in a narrow window following a disaster.
Lead author Dr Omid Ghasemi from the UNSW Institute for Climate Risk & Response (ICRR) says the study set out to answer a central question in climate policy: whether rising climate-related costs would drive stronger public action.
The UNSW researchers tracked thousands of data points from 2013 to 2022, comparing weather patterns and one-off extreme events, such as bushfires and floods, across different postcodes with shifts in climate beliefs, voting patterns, and solar panel installation.
“People tend to struggle to act on decisions that involve short-term costs for long-term benefits, like climate change, where efforts in emissions reduction or resilience investment may not pay off for decades.
“The question we wanted to test was whether first-hand experience of climate change – from floods, fires and heatwaves as well as gradual shifts in the weather – is enough to spur action.
“While the data cannot show what’s happening inside individual households, the scale of the analysis – controlling for a wide range of demographic factors – allows us to spot a shift in voting and beliefs in the aftermath of a weather-related disaster.
“Still, personal experience of climate change matters far less than economic and social forces in shaping what people believe and do.
“Extreme events and climate abnormalities are no substitute for political leadership. Waiting for climate impacts to spur climate action will not work.”
A brief ballot nudge
The researchers compared primary vote shares in federal elections with recent insurance claims for floods, cyclones, severe storms and hail across Australian postcodes.
They found that when a disaster occurred shortly before an election, support for parties with stronger climate policies — Labor and the Greens — rose slightly.
“That increase peaks when the disaster happens within a month of voting,” Dr Ghasemi says.
“In a close race, the data suggest a weather-related disaster a month before polling day may be enough to tip the result towards a more climate-aligned party.
“Still, the effect is modest. In practical terms, it’s a nudge, not a shift.”
The effect faded over time and after about four months, there was no association between a weather-related disaster and voting.
“By comparing disaster-hit postcodes with similar unaffected areas, and controlling for income, age and long-term weather trends, we could see the effect was real – but narrow and temporary,” he says.
A belated shift in belief, but not behaviour
In contrast, people’s belief that climate change was happening – and caused at least in part by human activity – appeared to strengthen in the months after a disaster.
The researchers analysed responses from more than 8000 survey participants to whether they believed climate change “is happening now and is caused mainly by human activities”.
“People were more likely to hold this belief when a disaster had occurred four to 12 months before they were surveyed,” Dr Ghasemi says.
“We found no meaningful shift in belief when the event was recent – in the previous one to three months.
“You could imagine that, right after a flood or fire, people are focused on immediate concerns, like repairing damage, dealing with insurance, or helping family and neighbours.
“Reflection about causes may come later and depend on how the event has been framed in the media, or within a person’s community.”
Crucially, any changes in belief were relatively small.
“They are detectable in large datasets,” he says, “but not large enough to transform public attitudes at scale.”
Disasters also did not appear to change personal climate behaviours, which the researchers measured through rooftop solar uptake.
“Across a decade that included the Black Summer fires, the 2019–20 drought and three consecutive La Niña years, households in affected postcodes were no more likely to install solar in the months or year after a disaster,” Dr Ghasemi says.
“A faint signal emerged seven to 12 months later – but it was trivial compared with bigger predictors like income, age and home ownership.”
Co-author Dr Matteo Malavasi, from UNSW’s School of Risk and Actuarial Studies, says the study offers rare insight into how people respond to gradual climate changes versus short, extreme events.
“These risks send very different signals,” Dr Malavasi says.
“Acute events may cut through, in a limited way. Slow, ongoing changes in climate seem to fade into the background.”
The researchers compared how unusual temperature and rainfall conditions were, relative to the previous 30 years with the same measures of belief and behaviour.
“The effects of longer-term unusual weather were inconsistent and small – too small to matter for real-world outcomes,” he says.
Why experience isn’t enough
Part of the explanation, says co-author Professor Ben Newell, lies in psychology.
“Research on risk perception shows people rely on short memory windows,” says Prof Newell, who is also Director of the ICRR.
“People may also recalibrate what counts as ‘normal’ weather based on recent years, making ongoing shifts less striking over time.
“It is the boiling-frog problem: when change comes in slow increments rather than a sudden jolt, people adapt rather than react, even as the cumulative risk grows.
“Catastrophes impact our risk judgments by virtue of their vividness and recency, but that effect fades fast, crowded out by everyday demands. Once the headlines disappear, so does the urgency.
“Another reason disasters have limited impact is that pre-existing factors strongly shape how people think about climate change.”
The researchers found political identity to be the most powerful predictor of climate belief, outweighing any response to extreme weather.
Liberal and National voters were far less likely to accept human-caused climate change than Greens supporters, even when living through the same disasters.
“One possible explanation is that perceptual filters – media habits, trusted messengers and community norms – continue to shape how people interpret extreme weather,” Dr Ghasemi says.
“Political factors appear far more influential than immediate personal experience of climate extremes.”
Structural factors, which are the economic and social settings that make action easier for some people and harder for others, also played a decisive role.
Solar uptake appears heavily influenced by subsidies, home ownership, rental arrangements, energy prices and income.
“Income and age were the strongest predictors of solar installation. Postcodes with an older and wealthier population on average adopted solar at higher rates, regardless of the weather,” Dr Ghasemi says.
“Gender appears to matter too. Areas with more female residents were slightly more likely to vote for climate-aligned parties but had lower rooftop solar uptake – likely reflecting uneven access to capital and home ownership.
“So, while the electorate does react to disasters and climate change, those reactions are modest, short-lived, and shaped by identity and economic resources. They are not what ultimately moves the needle on climate action.”
Contact details:
Elva Darnell
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