(Young) Generations as Social Identities: The Role of Latino*Millennial/Generation Z in Shaping Attitudes About Climate
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(Young) Generations as Social Identities: The Role of Latino*Millennial/Generation Z in Shaping Attitudes About Climate Change Ashley D. Ross1 · Stella M. Rouse2 Accepted: 29 September 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Climate change is a divisive issue in the United States, and most research has focused on partisan differences, thereby leaving the impact of social identities on climate change attitudes underexplored. However, research has shown that the strength of varying and overlapping identities is key to understanding political attitudes. In this paper, we introduce Millennial Generation/Generation Z (“MillZ”) as a meaningful social identity that influences political attitudes. Moreover, we contend that Latino*MillZ is an identity that has explanatory value for understanding climate change beliefs. While Latino and Millennial/Generation Z identities are not perfectly aligned, members of the Millennial Generation and Generation Z include a relatively high proportion of Latinos. Furthermore, since Latinos are disproportionately affected by climate change (i.e. the “climate gap”) the MillZ identity should generate increased concern for the environment. We utilize an original national survey to explore the interplay of Latino and MillZ identities on attitudes about climate change. Results show that Latino and MillZ identities are both associated with heightened climate change concern and that strong attachment to one identity is sufficient to induce concern when the other is weak. These findings point to the importance of exploring multiple identities and offer evidence that social identities are activated in different ways to influence climate change attitudes. Keywords Social identity · Climate change · Latino · Millennial Generation · Generation Z
A previous version of this paper was presented at the 2018 American Political Science Association meeting. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s1110 9-020-09649-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Stella M. Rouse [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
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Political Behavior
Climate change has been one of the most divisive issues in the United States. Often blamed for this discordance is partisan polarization—the vast ideological gap between Republicans and Democrats. This gap can be prominently observed through the contrasting policy actions pursued by the 44th and 45th presidents of the United States. In 2015, then President Barack Obama pledged American efforts to further reduce emissions and provide greater funding for alternative energy by making the U.S. a signatory to the agreement forged at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris (COP21) (Goldenberg et al. 2015). In June 2017, President Donald Trump announced that he would be pulling the United States out of the Paris Agreement because it disadvantaged American workers a
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