“Mood features of world leaders' commitments to carbon neutrality in <scp>COP28</scp> climate communication”

Abstract The world faces a critical era for climate action, and research pinpoints the role of linguistic analysis in enhancing our understanding of climate discourses (Zanaty, 2023; Dormer, 2020). In light of this, examining mood features in world leaders’ commitments to carbon neutrality is timely and essential. Defined as the balance between emitted and absorbed carbon (European Parliament, 2023), carbon neutrality has become a focal point in climate agendas. World leaders frequently use public speeches to shape perceptions and drive engagement on the issue. This study analyzes 85 speeches delivered at COP28, sourced from the official United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) website. A sample of 70 speeches was selected using Yamane's formula (1967), and Halliday's Systemic Functional Grammar (1985) was applied to examine 2,553 mood features in these speeches. Findings reveal a significant imbalance in mood feature usage, with 84.17% in the indicative mood to assess climate conditions, 9.67% in the imperative mood for directives, 2.50% in the conditional mood for future vision, 3.17% in the substantive mood for contextual framing, and 0.47% in the interrogative mood for audience engagement. This study underscores the importance of balanced mood features in climate discourses to reinforce global commitment toward emission reduction and to promote a more compelling, resonant narrative for climate action.