New study on climate action published

"Until now, it has often been assumed that people do not support climate protection more strongly or take action themselves because they believe they are in the minority with their attitude," says study leader Dr Kevin Tiede from the Institute for Planetary Health Behaviour at the University of Erfurt. "However, our results show that the reality is much more complex."

Majorities are underestimated, minorities overestimated

In five studies with a total of more than 5,000 participants from Germany and the USA, the research team investigated how people assess the attitudes and behaviour of others with regard to climate protection. This initially confirmed a familiar pattern: the vast majority of respondents supported climate protection measures in principle, and this majority was underestimated by others. However, when the researchers examined actual, comparatively rare climate protection behaviour for the first time, the opposite pattern emerged: the participants significantly overestimated how many others actually donated money for climate protection or were politically active.

The researchers explain this simultaneous underestimation and overestimation through a general psychological mechanism: people tend to mentally shift extreme values "towards the centre". As a result, large majorities are underestimated and small minorities overestimated.

"Part of what has so far been labelled pluralistic ignorance – the assumption that other people are less willing to protect the climate than they actually are – could be due to very general thought processes when estimating proportions," explains Tiede. "This changes the perspective on a field of research that has grown considerably in recent years – and also the conclusions we can draw from it."

Greater focus on communicating solutions and political framework conditions

The results are particularly relevant for the public debate on climate communication. In recent years, it has often been suggested that informing people about the broad support for climate protection could trigger more social commitment. However, in the studies, correcting such misperceptions did not increase the willingness to donate money for climate protection. "Our results suggest that correcting misperceptions alone is not enough to promote actual climate protection behaviour," says Tiede.

Rather, it is necessary to tackle practical hurdles, a lack of knowledge about effective measures or political framework conditions that facilitate climate-friendly behaviour. Tiede continues: "Support for climate protection already exists in many areas and this finding is very robust. However, the key challenge may be less about convincing people and more about facilitating climate-friendly behaviour and making effective solutions visible."

Publication
Tiede, K. E., Maur, K. & Betsch, C. (2026). People systematically under- and overestimate public engagement in climate action. Nature Climate Change. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-026-02668-z