FAMILIES and businesses across Wales are hiding from reality, maintaining a “psychological distance” from climate change because they believe it won’t impact on them, academics claimed last night.

As world leaders prepare to gather in Copenhagen in three weeks to discuss a new climate protocol, psychologists claim the Welsh public has become “bored” with the ongoing debate over climate change’s potential long-term and devastating consequences.

Dr Lorraine Whitmarsh, at Cardiff University, says her research shows people in Wales have become slow, or in some cases, reluctant to change their own comfortable lifestyles for the sake of the planet.

“The majority believe climate change will only affect people in other regions or future generations,” said the psychology lecturer.

“Most people have not changed their behaviour in response to climate change; and few are willing to make significant changes to their lifestyle.

“In part, it is due to the characteristics of climate change – a risk issue which is complex, global and long-term. It challenges our fundamental assumptions about quality of life, progress and consumption, with uncomfortable implications which many prefer to ignore or deny.”

Her research, she said, has found that the proportion of people who believe claims human activities are changing the climate are exaggerated has doubled within the last five years – from 15% to 29%.

This is despite the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2007) concluding that climate change is happening and that human actions are making a significant contribution to this change. And the influential Stern Report (2006), commissioned by the UK Treasury, concluded that the future costs of inaction with regards to climate change will actually be far greater than the costs of taking immediate action.

Chartered psychologist Martin Lloyd-Elliot, of the British Psychological Society, says the consequences of climate change around the world are so potentially devastating that it is a lot easier for people to simply not think about it.

“It is what we call resistance,” he said. “This is a defence mechanism against a shocking reality.

“Some people genuinely feel that the problem is so huge that there is nothing that they, as an individual, can do that will make any difference.

“Others feel that although they could make changes to their personal lifestyles, they feel that their friends and neighbours are not making enough lifestyle changes that could equate to a collective benefit.

“Human beings, by nature, tend to balance selfishness with collective spirit.

“And it can be difficult for us to do this equation in our head and make sacrifices, when we cannot see any immediate benefit from those sacrifices.

“Many people need a direct and strong incentive to make such sacrifices.” A spokesman for the British Psychological Society added: “For the majority of the scientific community and those in Government, climate change is no longer a contested issue; but what is contested is what we do about it.

“Governments now recognise that climate change and its consequences need to be addressed by changing people’s behaviour and everyday practices; technological fix alone will not be enough.

“However, there are already signs of ‘climate fatigue’. A recent report by The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IPPR (2009) suggests that some people are now bored by the subject of climate change and express a cynicism about the motivations of government in encouraging action on climate change.

“Psychology has a key role to play in the formulation of mitigation and adaptation strategies which take account of the human responses.

“Failure to do so will mean that climate policies are less effective than anticipated or at worse might fail entirely. Policies also have to be effectively communicated and turned into action if we are to arrest and even reverse current climate projections.”

Professor Nick Pidgeon, also a lecturer at Cardiff University and director of a three-year project supported by the Leverhulme Trust, exploring behaviour in relation to climate change and energy choices, said the issue has fallen down the agenda in Wales, the UK and abroad.

“This climate change distancing phenomenon is not unique to Wales; it is even happening in the USA – despite President Barack Obama pushing the climate change issue more than his predecessor did,” he said.

“But there is no clear reason why this should be the case. It could be to do with the recession and people worrying about their jobs and how to pay the mortgage. Maybe their attitudes to climate change will improve when we move out of recession.”

Dr Whitmarsh is now researching ways to overcome such “psychological distance” and to engage individuals and communities in climate change response strategies.