As part of a larger Climate and Social Policy initiative by Rutgers University, the Eagleton Poll surveyed 1,003 New Jersey adults in July 2008 on household energy conservation and climate change, with funds provided by PSEG.
This study was designed to collect information on respondents’ beliefs about and knowledge of climate change, and what relation (if any) these might have to their energy conservation and clean energy habits.
Energy saving actions
80% of respondents reported lowering the use of their heating and cooling systems in the last 2 years. Roughly 75% said they had installed compact fluorescent light bulbs. Roughly two-thirds each said they had bought energy-efficient appliances in the last two years and had programmable thermostats in their homes A third or a bit more each had installed more efficient heating or cooling systems, replaced windows, or added or replaced insulation. “Clean energy” options of buying “green electricity” or installing solar panels were taken by less than 10%.
Asked to evaluate the persuasiveness of possible messages aimed at getting people to reduce energy use, the most convincing argument for all respondents was that conservation “saves money.” About two-thirds of the sample also rated as very convincing arguments about protection for one’s immediate descendants, “better care of God’s earth,” and reducing payments to foreign countries. Protection of other species and an increase in national security were least convincing.
Belief in human caused climate change
A majority of respondents (54%) believe global warming is a proven fact and mostly caused by human activity. Some 18% believe it is a proven fact but not caused by human activity, while 21% believe it is not as yet a proven fact.
Asked how well they understood “global warming, sometimes called the ‘greenhouse effect,’” 31% said very well, 51% fairly well, 13% not very well, and 5% not at all. This compares to national Gallup poll findings from March 2008 of 21%, 59%, 18% and 2%, respectively.
However, large proportions of the sample believed that human activities experts believe do not contribute to climate change in fact do. Thought to be major causes of climate change were pollution emissions from business and industry (77%), ozone reduction in the upper atmosphere (69%), use of insecticides (42%), use of aerosol spray cans (37%) and nuclear power (37%). Belief in expert-identified human activities as major causes also was substantial: destruction of tropical forests (73%), car driving (66%), use of coal and oil by electric utilities (50%), and heating and cooling of homes (34%).
Some 41% were very concerned, 40% somewhat concerned, 10% not very concerned, and 8% not at all concerned about climate change. Three-quarters “somewhat” or “strongly agreed” that climate change would have catastrophic impacts on society. Two-thirds think it is somewhat or very likely that New Jersey will experience serious negative effects from climate change during their lifetimes, and nearly as many disagree that only people and animals far from New Jersey will be affected.
Majorities supported the responsibility and need for federal and New Jersey state governments, business, and individuals to take action to stem global warming.

Relations between energy behavior and climate change beliefs
There were few statistically significant relationships between belief in human caused climate change and reporting having engaged in energy saving actions. Believers in human-caused climate change were more likely to report having bought energy-efficient appliances, reduced their use of heating and air conditioning, and installed compact fluorescent light bulbs, but did not differ from skeptics on seven other energy conservation and clean-energy actions.
Energy behavior was weakly related to monthly energy costs at best.
Overall, the number of energy behaviors was increased by home ownership, concern about climate change, and monthly energy bills, and decreased by accurate knowledge of false causes. But collectively demographic, energy and climate change variables explained only 8% of the variance in number of energy behaviors.
Holding other variables constant, home-ownership was the most influential factor in particular energy behaviors, increasing use of insulation, efficient heating and cooling, efficient appliances, window installation and programmable thermostats. Concern about climate change increased action on appliances, but reduced lower use of heating and cooling systems, and reduced use of compact fluorescent bulbs. Accurate knowledge of false human causes of climate change increased purchase of green electricity but decreased use of efficient heating and cooling systems. Accurate knowledge of true human causes was associated with less reduction in use of air conditioning. Subjective knowledge increased insulation but reduced efficient heating and cooling.
Relations between climate change beliefs
Respondents who believe in human caused climate change had more accurate knowledge that others about true human causes of global warming (i.e., cars, utilities, home heating and cooling, tropical forest destruction), but were as likely as others to have false beliefs – for example, rating both ozone depletion and nuclear power as major causes as well. Human-change believers and women were more likely to have accurate knowledge, while conservatives and Republicans were less likely.
Everyone found the national-security argument for reducing energy use equally unconvincing, but human-change believers thought all other arguments were more convincing than did others. They ranked family and caring for God’s earth higher, and foreign payments lower, in persuasion than did others, and their overall ranking of the arguments’ persuasiveness was identical to that of people who thought they were highly knowledgeable.
Conclusions
If reported high rates of energy saving actions are accurate, and only confirmation with actual usage data will provide confidence on that point, these results may throw into question how much “low hanging” fruit there is for energy saving programs to target.
Although general support for government action is high, this support might fall dramatically when specific actions could directly affect citizens rather than business and industry, making it important to understand such support as New Jersey moves to regulate green house gases.
The relations between belief in human-caused climate change, knowledge of true and false causes, and household action on energy conservation and clean energy are not nearly as straightforward as one might wish. Skepticism about climate change does not deter people from either reducing energy use or believing that climate change needs to be acted against by government, business and individuals, but believers in human-caused climate change are not always more likely to act or have more accurate beliefs. Citizens are not well informed about climate change, but being informed is not well-correlated with action. These findings point up the need to reexamine the goals of and assumptions behind energy saving education programs, and not only improving their designs but considering other approaches to promoting energy efficiency as well, such as price incentives, norm based approaches, marketing strategies and provision of real time consumption information.

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