Inspiring Support for Climate Solutions: Pathways for Impact Through Solutions Journalism

Media is one avenue for empowering the public to act on urgent threats like climate change. Solutions journalism focuses on responses to problems. While this form of reporting offers a promising avenue for equipping the public to learn about climate action, message effects are under-researched. This work draws on social cognitive theory, exemplification theory, and theories of risk communication to examine the effects of discrete news story components on collective climate action intentions and behavior through an online experiment ( N = 1,202). Findings identify cognitive mechanisms responsible for effects and offer theoretical insights for future research.