ArticlePloS one2018
Changes in perceived scientific consensus shift beliefs about climate change and GM food safety.
Article in PloS one, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed.
- The gateway (mis)belief model: How misinformation impacts perceptions of scientific consensus and attitudes towards climate change.British journal of psychology (London, England : 1953) · 2026Article
- Combined signals of scientific and social consensus best mobilize action on societal challenges even if government and industry oppose.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- What We Think Others Think and Do About Climate Change: A Multicountry Test of Pluralistic Ignorance and Public-Consensus Messaging.Psychological science · 2025Article
- A 27-country test of communicating the scientific consensus on climate change.Nature human behaviour · 2024Article
- Development of a novel methodology for ascertaining scientific opinion and extent of agreement.PloS one · 2024Article
- Endorsement of scientific inquiry promotes better evaluation of climate policy evidence.Climatic change · 2023Article
- Believing in or Denying Climate Change for Questionable Reasons: Generic Conspiracist Beliefs, Personality, and Climate Change Perceptions of Romanian University Students.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Interventions Based on Social Norms Could Benefit From Considering Adversarial Information Environments: Comment on Constantino et al. (2022).Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society · 2022Article
- Article
- Scaling up interactive argumentation by providing counterarguments with a chatbot.Nature human behaviour · 2022Article
- Social Prevalence Is Rationally Integrated in Belief Updating.Open mind : discoveries in cognitive science · 2022Article
- Communicating expert consensus increases personal support for COVID-19 mitigation policies.Journal of applied social psychology · 2022Article
- Influences of study design on the effectiveness of consensus messaging: The case of medicinal cannabis.PloS one · 2021Article
- Majority rules: how good are we at aggregating convergent opinions?Evolutionary human sciences · 2019Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Despite an overwhelming scientific consensus, a sizable minority of people doubt that human activity is causing climate change. Communicating the existence of a scientific consensus has been suggested as a way to correct individuals' misperceptions about human-caused climate change and other scientific issues, though empirical support is mixed. We report an experiment in which psychology students were presented with consensus information about two issues, and subsequently reported their perception of the level of consensus and extent of their endorsement of those issues. We find that messages about scientific consensus on the reality of anthropogenic climate change and the safety of genetically modified food shift perceptions of scientific consensus. Using mediation models we also show that, for both these issues, high consensus messages also increase reported personal agreement with the scientific consensus, mediated by changes in perceptions of a scientific consensus. This confirms the role of perceived consensus in informing personal beliefs about climate change, though results indicate the impact of single, one-off messages may be limited.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.