Research has shown that self-affirmation often leads to more adaptive responses to messages that focus on behaviour-specific, individual threats. However, little is known about the effects of self-affirmation in the context of a multifaceted collective threat, such as climate change. In the current thesis I apply self-affirmation theory to the psychology of climate change. More specifically, I propose that differentially polarized environmental orientations can have an impact on self-affirmation effects. In Chapter 1, I provide a general integration of the self-affirmation literature, the literature on sceptical responses to climate change, and the findings reported in the current thesis. The results from six empirical studies are presented in the following four chapters. In Chapter 2, I present findings that indicated that sceptical responses to climate change information are not always reduced through self-affirmation, but are instead strongly dependent on people's initial levels of rejection of environmental problems. In Chapter 3, I suggest that in the absence of a persuasive threatening message, self-affirmation can serve to validate a person's initial worldviews about environmental issues. In line with this suggestion, results demonstrated that self-affirmation led to more pro-environmental motives among participants with positive ecological worldviews but led to less pro-environmental motives among participants with negative ecological worldviews. In Chapter 4, I examine self-affirmation effects on the acceptance of climate change information. Results showed that self-affirmation promoted perceptions of greater climate change consequences and more self-efficacy among initially sceptical participants. Additionally, self-affirmation reduced pessimism among less sceptical participants. In Chapter 5, I present evidence that showed that self-affirmation resulted in more acceptance of information portraying the UK's contribution to climate change problems among participants with high national identification, while group-affirmation resulted in more information acceptance among participants with low national identification. These effects were only apparent among participants with negative ecological worldviews.

This document is a summary of research conducted to develop and apply climate analysis tools toward a better understanding of the past and future of hydroclimate variability in the state of Utah. Two pilot studies developed data management and climate analysis tools subsequently applied to our region of interest. The first investigated the role of natural atmospheric forcing in the inter-annual variability of precipitation of the Sahel region in Africa, and found a previously undocumented link with the East Atlantic mode, which explains 29% of variance in regional precipitation. An analysis of output from an operational seasonal climate forecast model revealed a failure in the model to reproduce this linkage, thus highlighting a shortcoming in model performance. The second pilot study studied long-term trends in the strength of the Great Plains low-level jet, an driver of storm development in the region’s wet spring season. Our analysis showed that since 1979 the low-level jet has strengthened as shifted the timing of peak activity, resulting in shifts both in time and location for peak precipitation, possibly the result of anthropogenic forcing. Our third study used a unique tree-ring dataset to create a reconstruction of April 1 snow water equivalent, an important measure of water supply in the Intermountain West, for the state of Utah to 1850. Analysis of the reconstruction shows the majority of snowpack variability occurs monotonically over the whole state at decadal to multidecadal frequencies. The final study evaluated decadal prediction performance of climate models participating in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5. We found that the analyzed models exhibit modest skill in prediction of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and better skill in prediction of global temperature trends post 1960.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität, Rostock, 2005. / Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. [187]-214).

Thesis (doctoral) - Universität, Rostock, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [187]-214).

<p>Jag har i detta arbete ställt mig frågan <em>Vilka kunskaper/färdigheter behöver en soldat utbildad i subarktiskt klimat kompletteras med innan insats i tropiskt klimat?</em> vilken jag valt att svara på genom två delproblem:</p><p>-          Vilka krav på individens färdigheter ställer det tropiska klimatet?</p><p>-          Vilka färdigheter utvecklar soldaten vid utbildning i subarktiskt klimat?</p><p> Jag har sedan använt svenska vinterreglementen för att ta reda på vilka kunskaper och färdigheter som en soldat utbildad i subarktiskt klimat införskaffar sig under sin grundutbildning. Därefter har jag fördjupat mig i den amerikanska djungelmanualen för att skapa mig en bild av vilka krav det tropiska klimatet ställer på individens färdigheter.</p><p>Under studierna av de olika reglementena urskiljde jag då ett antal påverkansfaktorer vilka jag valde att använda som analysverktyg för att kunna göra en komparation mellan de olika klimatens krav på individen. Dessa olika påverkansfaktorer är Acklimatisering, Vätska/mat, Fysisk status, Klädsel, Hygien, Psykisk status och Sjukdomar/skador. Jag har sedan utifrån varje analysverktyg jämfört vad respektive miljös litteratur säger om individen kopplat till just den påverkansfaktorn och sedan diskuterat respektive påverkansfaktor var för sig. Jag har då kommit fram till både likheter och skillnader i uppträdandet mellan respektive klimat. Detta har då resulterat i vilka färdigheter som en soldat utbildad i subarktiskt klimat saknar för att kunna göra en insats i tropiskt klimat och behöver kompletteras med.</p>

Jag har i detta arbete ställt mig frågan Vilka kunskaper/färdigheter behöver en soldat utbildad i subarktiskt klimat kompletteras med innan insats i tropiskt klimat? vilken jag valt att svara på genom två delproblem: -          Vilka krav på individens färdigheter ställer det tropiska klimatet? -          Vilka färdigheter utvecklar soldaten vid utbildning i subarktiskt klimat?  Jag har sedan använt svenska vinterreglementen för att ta reda på vilka kunskaper och färdigheter som en soldat utbildad i subarktiskt klimat införskaffar sig under sin grundutbildning. Därefter har jag fördjupat mig i den amerikanska djungelmanualen för att skapa mig en bild av vilka krav det tropiska klimatet ställer på individens färdigheter. Under studierna av de olika reglementena urskiljde jag då ett antal påverkansfaktorer vilka jag valde att använda som analysverktyg för att kunna göra en komparation mellan de olika klimatens krav på individen. Dessa olika påverkansfaktorer är Acklimatisering, Vätska/mat, Fysisk status, Klädsel, Hygien, Psykisk status och Sjukdomar/skador. Jag har sedan utifrån varje analysverktyg jämfört vad respektive miljös litteratur säger om individen kopplat till just den påverkansfaktorn och sedan diskuterat respektive påverkansfaktor var för sig. Jag har då kommit fram till både likheter och skillnader i uppträdandet mellan respektive klimat. Detta har då resulterat i vilka färdigheter som en soldat utbildad i subarktiskt klimat saknar för att kunna göra en insats i tropiskt klimat och behöver kompletteras med.

This dissertation uses multiple tools to investigate tropical anvil, i.e., thick, non-precipitating cloud associated with deep convection with the main objectives to provide a climatology of tropics-wide anvil properties and a better understanding of anvil formation, and to provide a more realistic assessment of the radiative impact of tropical anvil on the large-scale circulation. Based on 10 years (1998-2007) of observations, anvil observed by the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Precipitation (PR) shows significant geographical variations, which can be linked to variations in the parent convection. Strong upper level wind shear appears to assist the generation of anvil and may further explain the different anvil statistics over land and ocean. Variations in the large-scale environment appear to play a more important role in anvil production in regions where convection regularly attains heights greater than 7 km. For regions where convection is less deep, variations in the depth of the convection and the large-scale environment likely contribute more equally to anvil generation. Anvil radiative heating profiles are estimated by extrapolating millimeter cloud radar (MMCR) radiative properties from Manus to the 10-year TRMM PR record. When the unconditional anvil areal coverage is taken into account, the anvil radiative heating becomes quite weak, increasing the PR latent heating profile by less than 1 percent at mid and upper levels. Stratiform rain and cirrus radiative heating contributions increase the upper level latent heating by 12 percent. This tropical radiative heating only slightly enhances the latent heating driven model response throughout the tropics, but more significantly over the East Pacific. These modest circulation changes suggest that previous studies may have overemphasized the importance of radiative heating in terms of Walker and Hadley circulation variations. Further, the relationship of cloud radiative heating to latent heating needs to be taken into account for more realistic studies of cloud radiative forcing on the large-scale circulation.

published_or_final_version / Community Medicine / Master / Master of Public Health

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