Rural residents’ perception and adaptation of climate change in the southeast of Qinghai—Tibet plateau

Climate change has widely impacted human and natural systems across regions worldwide. Agriculture is the most sensitive to climate change among all global production sectors. Many rural residents lack a clear understanding of climate change or its negative impacts, resulting in their inability to take timely adaptation measures and causing significant losses. This study investigates rural residents’ perceptions of climate change and their adaptation behaviors in the southeastern Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau using household survey and interview data. The results show that although climate change in the region is pronounced, rural residents’ perception remains relatively weak: only 61.74% of rural residents s perceive climate change, and 51.41% have consciously adopted adaptation measures. A Heckman selection model indicates that rural residents’ adaptation decisions are based on their perception of climate change, which is significantly associated with direct perceptions of rising temperatures and declining precipitation over the past five years, as well as with the diversity of climate information sources. Rural residents’ adaptation behavior is positively related to education of the household head, household size, and duration of residence. Further binary regression analyses reveal that technical adaptation is positively associated with age, education, household size, the proportion of household members engaged in agriculture, and perceived personal impacts of climate change, whereas economic and other adaptation strategies are positively related to education but negatively related to age and the perception that climate change has increased crop pests and diseases. Based on these findings, this study proposes targeted recommendations to better promote rural residents’ climate change adaptation and enhance the resilience of agricultural systems in the region.