When a bleak future comes closer: interaction effects of emotion and temporal distance framing in climate change communication

Abstract

Given the widespread use of emotional and distance framing in climate change communication, this study investigated how these strategies interact to influence perceptions and behaviors related to climate change. Guided by the Situational Theory of Problem Solving and through an experimental survey, the research revealed that fear-inducing messages led to greater recognition of problems and involvement when combined with short-term temporal frames, compared to hope-inducing messages. These findings suggest that the effects of emotional appeals are conditioned on the temporal distance of the issue highlighted in climate change communication, offering a more nuanced understanding of the differentiated effects of fear and hope appeals and practical insights for crafting persuasive messages.

A bleak future approaching: interaction effects of emotion and temporal distance framing in climate change communication

Climate change remains one of the most pressing challenges that humans face today [1]. Scholars in environmental communication have explored how persuasive messages can mobilize the public to combat climate change. Among these efforts, emotion has emerged as a crucial factor influencing individual perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors related to climate change [2]. For instance, fear and hope —two future-oriented emotions with almost opposite valences [3]—have garnered significant scholarly attention for their potential to drive climate actions [4, 5]. However, evidence regarding their effects is mixed [4, 6], suggesting that there may be boundaries on when and how these emotions exert their influence.

One potential boundary is how the threat is temporally framed—Specifically, whether fear-inducing or hope-inducing outcomes are expected sooner or later. Considering that climate change is often viewed as a distant threat [7], and the many recommendations and communications aimed at making it more immediate and personal [8], it would be valuable to examine how these two ubiquitous emotions work within messages framed as temporally distant or close. Integrating emotional and psychological distance frames could enhance message persuasiveness and shed light on the differentiated effects and mechanisms of fear and hope on climate change engagement. Therefore, this study aims to compare the effects of fear and hope and investigate how they interact with temporal distance framing to shape perceptions and behaviors toward climate change.

Literature review

Hope vs. fear in climate change communication

Emotions are an important determinant of human attitudes and behaviors [9]. Emotion theorists argue that an emotion consists of several core components: a cognitive component (e.g., appraisals of the implications of stimuli for well-being), a motivational component (e.g., action tendencies and other forms of action readiness), a somatic component (e.g., physiological activity within and outside the brain), a motor component (e.g., facial and vocal expressions and behavior), and a subjective component (e.g., experience and feelings) [10]. Discrete emotions differ in these components, making each qualitatively distinctive. For instance, fear involves an appraisal of imminent threat [3], two types of action tendencies—adaptive tendencies to take necessary actions to minimize the threat and maladaptive tendencies to flee [11], the experience of shivering and rapid breathing, and a fearful facial expression with wide-open eyes and dilated pupils. In contrast, hope arises from perceiving a positive future outcome despite current threats [3], includes an approach action tendency that motivates actual or preparatory actions toward achieving a desired goal, involves changes in heart rate and skin conductance, and is associated with a feeling of eagerness [12].

In climate change communication, hope and fear, representing positive and negative emotions respectively, have been extensively studied both independently (e.g., [13]) and together [14, 15]. According to appraisal theories [3, 16], fear typically arises when individuals encounter a situation that threatens to place them in a state or outcome inconsistent with their motives (e.g., a punishment they do not want) and when they have little power to alter the situation [16]. For instance, a hurricane that potentially destroys one’s house can provoke fear. Many iconic climate change messages aiming to evoke fear depict circumstances like this, such as images of polar bears on melting ice or dried-up lakes with dead fish [17].

The use of fear appeals in climate change communication is widespread, yet controversial. Because fear can induce either adaptive or maladaptive coping strategies, depending on an individual’s perceived ability to alter the situation [11], fear appeals can either motivate action or drive people away [18]. Indeed, fear appeals may trigger counterproductive defense mechanisms such as denial, apathy, and avoidance, also known as the flight response [3, 5, 18]. Empirical evidence supports both the advantages and disadvantages of using fear appeals. Some studies demonstrate that fear appeals increase awareness and perception of climate change risks [19]. Conversely, a substantial body of research indicates that fear may not effectively change perceptions or behaviors [14, 20, 21]. Other studies have found evidence supporting the counterproductive effects; fear-inducing messages inhibit one’s self-efficacy and mitigation behavioral intention [17, 22].

Considering the null or even counterproductive effects of fear appeals, scholars began to seek more suitable alternatives such as hope [5]. Like fear, hope is a future-oriented emotion [12] and is triggered by circumstances with uncertain outcomes where individuals lack power or control over the situation [16]. Unlike fear, however, the future outcome associated with hope is consistent with one’s motives or personal goals (e.g., a desired reward). While fear can elicit a flight response, hope is generally considered a “rainbow in the mind” [23] and is highly motivating for individuals to pursue desired outcomes and create a better future [12]. With these characteristics, hope has been found to be strongly related to willingness to take pro-environmental actions and support climate change policies [13, 24], interest in climate protection, and perceived climate change message effectiveness [12], although evidence also exists that hope may lower motivations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions [25].

Given the accumulated evidence supporting both fear and hope appeals in engaging individuals, researchers have begun to directly compare the effects of these two emotions. However, their effects could vary depending on the outcomes being investigated. For instance, in terms of raising awareness or perception of risk, fear appeals may be more effective than hope appeals. This is because fear appeals often highlight threats and negative consequences [18], whereas hope appeals typically emphasize positive progress and outcomes. The former could make the issue seem more severe, while the latter could reduce its perceived severity. Research supports this notion, showing that participants exposed to optimistic messages about carbon emissions were less likely to perceive climate change as a personal risk and experienced less distress, which in turn reduced their motivation for mitigation efforts compared to those who received pessimistic messages [25]. Similarly, Skurka et al. [19] found that while threat videos increased perceptions of climate change risks, videos using humor (a positive emotion like hope) did not have the same effect.

However, in terms of self-efficacy, fear can diminish it, as gloomy messages may overwhelm people, whereas hope can bolster self-efficacy by showing that their actions can make a meaningful difference. Indeed, interviews have revealed that catastrophic and alarmist visual images reduce individuals’ sense of efficacy and engagement in addressing climate change, whereas hopeful messages tend to enhance it [17]. This is why many scholars argue that fear appeals should be accompanied by efficacy information to maximize their impact [18].

Hope and fear also exhibit distinct impacts on policy support. In a nationally representative survey, hope has been strongly linked to support for national and energy policies, whereas fear shows no such relationship [26]. Furthermore, negative emotions, including fear, are closely associated with mitigation behaviors, while hope does not demonstrate the same association [25]. This differential effect has also been observed in studies of anti-smoking advertising [27]. At the same time, some researchers have found no distinct effects between hope and fear on risk perception, likelihood of behavior change, and climate activism [14]. Due to these mixed findings, further investigation is warranted to explore how these two emotions differently influence various outcomes and to compare their effects under more specific conditions.

Fear and hope with temporal frames

Because fear and hope differ in their appraisals and motivational tendencies [3], rather than determining which emotion is universally more persuasive for complex issues like climate change, it may be more practical to explore when each emotion is more effective so that practitioners can use them more effectively. To this end, scholars have examined the boundary conditions of emotional appeals in climate change communication by investigating how these frames interact with other framing strategies to influence environmental attitudes and behaviors. For instance, Lu [28] examined the interaction effects of emotional appeals and gain versus loss framing—a widely used strategy in pro-environmental communication—in communicating sea star wasting disease. The study found that sadness appeals were more effective when paired with gain framing, whereas hope appeals were more impactful with loss framing.

Another possible boundary is the temporal distance of climate change. According to Construal Level Theory [29], temporal distance is one dimension of psychological distance that refers to the personal perception of how near or distant something feels from oneself, in terms of time (i.e., temporal distance), space (i.e., spatial distance), relevance (i.e., social distance), and likelihood of happening (i.e., hypothetical distance) [29]. People form abstract mental representations of psychologically distant events and concrete ones of events that are close. For climate change issues, individuals often perceive it as distant in time and space, which can be a potential obstacle to engaging in climate mitigation actions [7]. Therefore, many attempts have been made to make climate change seem more immediate and relevant by using distance framing strategies [8].

Because both fear and hope are derived from appraisals of the possibilities of future outcomes [3, 30], depicting how soon a future outcome will occur using temporal distance frames could affect the intensity and effects of these two emotions. For example, an impending outcome may seem more likely to happen and is perceived as more concrete and detailed [29], which could intensify the induced emotion and the associated action tendencies. For instance, a scary object moving closer often repels people further away. Indeed, research has found that individuals report stronger fear when climate change is depicted and perceived as being closer [31]. Thus, combining a fear appeal with a near frame could have a multiplicative effect. In contrast, a distant frame may make the difference between the persuasiveness of fear and hope appeals less prominent, as either the positive or negative outcome could become so abstract and vague that individuals may not react to it strongly.

Empirical evidence suggests that interaction effects between emotion and distance framing exist. For instance, Lee et al. [32] created messages about carbon pollution framed either globally (relating to the world) or locally (specific to Taiwan) and used either fear appeals (emphasizing detailed consequences inducing fear) or hope appeals (highlighting positive outcomes inducing hope). They found that when the issue was framed globally, fear appeals increased attention, positive attitudes toward the green issue, and behavioral intentions. By contrast, when the issue was framed locally, hope appeals were more effective [32].

While Lee et al. [32] focus on global vs. local frames in geographical space, fear and hope may interact differently with temporal frames to influence climate change engagement. Research indicates that negative future events often feel closer in time compared to positive future events. For example, individuals perceive a moving date to a less desirable office as nearer than a move to a more pleasant office [33, 34]. Scholars have offered several explanations for these findings, including loss aversion—losses seem larger and therefore more proximal than gains. Additionally, people process negative information more thoroughly, leading them to focus on the endpoint rather than the interval between now and then, which makes negative outcomes seem closer. Finally, individuals are motivated to expedite losses to minimize dread and delay gains to maximize savoring [33]. These studies suggest that negative, fear-inducing outcomes and positive, hope-inducing outcomes differ in their perceived temporal distance. Pairing them with different temporal distance frames may further influence how individuals feel about these outcomes.

Considering the various perceptions related to climate change that could influence engagement, and the fact that the two emotional appeals function differently in shaping these perceptions (e.g., [17,18,19, 25, 26]), it is vital to include essential and distinctive perceptual variables as dependent variables to fully gauge their interaction effects on different aspects of individual perceptions of the problem. To this end, we refer to the theoretical framework of the Situational Theory of Problem Solving (STOPS) [35], an important public relations theory. STOPS is a comprehensive model that delineates important variables related to one’s perception, motivation, and their relationships with communicative behaviors. This research investigates how emotional appeals interact with temporal distance to influence three perceptual variables: problem recognition, involvement recognition, and constraint recognition, and ultimately affect behavioral intention.

Situational theory of problem solving

STOPS explores individual communicative actions in problematic situations. Grounded in the Situational Theory of Publics [35], both theories aim to understand the driving forces behind public engagement in active communication during significant life events. Unlike approaches that view participants as passive recipients, STOPS positions them as proactive communicative actors seeking to address problems [35]. It proposes that people’s motivation to seek information varies across situations as their perception of the situation changes, including their understanding of the problem, their connection to it, and the obstacles they encounter. Specifically, STOPS identifies three variables—problem recognition, involvement recognition, and constraint recognition—as factors influencing people’s motivation to solve a problem, captured by the situational motivation variable. Situational motivation serves as a mediator between the perceptual variables and the focal dependent variable of STOPS—communicative action in problem solving. As Kim and Grunig [35] noted, perceiving an issue does not lead individuals to act on it until they are motivated to do so. STOPS identifies three types of communicative action among problem solvers: information acquisition, selection, and transmission.

To acquire information, individuals either actively seek it by intentionally scanning their environment (i.e., information seeking) or passively attend to relevant information that comes their way (i.e., information attending). Next, individuals select information that is either perceived as relevant to a current problem (i.e., information permitting) or has been carefully evaluated for its quality and aligns with their preferred approach to solving the problem and their desired outcomes (i.e., information forefending). Lastly, individuals may transmit information either actively, by sharing it even when it is not solicited (i.e., information forwarding), or passively, when it is requested (i.e., information sharing). With these multidimensional aspects of the dependent variable, STOPS is expected to be more powerful in explaining general communication behaviors [35, 36]. Referent criteria, defined as past relevant knowledge or subjective judgments that influence how one approaches problem solving, also exert influence on situational motivation [37].

Problem recognition refers to the discrepancy between expected and experiential states [35]. When individuals perceive that action should be taken but encounter a lack of immediately applicable solutions, they may perceive the situation as problematic [35]. This variable, focusing on how severe, important and urgent one perceives a problem, is similar to other constructs in the risk communication literature, such as risk perception [38], perceived hazard characteristics [39] and issue salience [40]. As noted earlier, because fear appeals emphasize the potential danger and harm that individuals would face if they do not accept the messages’ recommendations [41], it may worsen the expected states, leading individuals to believe an issue is more severe than originally anticipated. By contrast, hope appeals often highlight positive or goal-congruent outcomes [12, 30], which may lead individuals to appraise a problem as less severe [25]. As a positive outcome is expected to come soon, an issue may seem less problematic for hopeful participants. However, proximising a negative outcome would make the threat seem more urgent and problematic. As a result, we expected to observe a larger gap in problem recognition between fear-inducing and hope-inducing messages as temporal distance decreases. Thus, we proposed:

Hypothesis(H) 1

Emotional appeals and temporal distance interact to affect problem recognition. Specifically, fear appeals lead to greater problem recognition than hope appeals, and this difference is larger when paired with a short-term temporal frame.

Involvement recognition refers to one’s perceived connection between a problematic situation and oneself, as well as to significant others [35]. STOPS posits that when perceived involvement is low, individuals are less attentive and active in seeking information about the issue [42]. Given that hope tends to increase approach motivation and fear triggers avoidance responses when individuals have low efficacy [3, 18], individuals may feel more connected to a hopeful future than to a fearsome one. As a positive, hopeful future outcome seems closer, individuals may feel more eager and engaged. In contrast, when a threatening, fearsome outcome is approaching, individuals may mentally disengage from the issue as a coping mechanism. We thus propose:

H2

Emotional appeals and temporal distance interact to affect involvement recognition. Specifically, hope appeals leads to greater involvement recognition than fear appeals, and this difference is larger when paired with a short-term temporal frame.

However, one could argue that an alternative hypothesis might also be plausible. Since STOPS research often finds a positive relationship between problem recognition and involvement recognition [42, 43], similar interaction effects on involvement recognition might be anticipated as those observed with problem recognition. Specifically, fear could draw individuals closer to an issue, while hope might distance them from it. Empirical studies support this notion, showing that images portraying climate change as personally relevant often depict fearsome scenarios, such as starving children and dried-up lakes with dead fish. In contrast, images perceived as less personally relevant tend to be neutral or positive, such as sunflower fields and cafes [17]. Moreover, because negative losses are perceived as temporally closer than positive gains [33], as temporal distance decreases, a fear appeal emphasizing these negative outcomes may intensify this perception, making the negative outcome feel closer and more personally relevant. Given these conflicting arguments and evidence, we propose a competing hypothesis to H2:

H2c

Emotional appeals and temporal distance interact to affect involvement recognition. Specifically, fear appeals lead to greater involvement recognition than hope appeals, and this difference is larger when paired with a short-term temporal frame.

Even when individuals perceive themselves as relevant to a dire situation, they may be hesitant to address the problem until they find their efforts meaningful. Reflecting this perspective, STOPS includes constrain recognition as a situational factor, which refers to individuals’ perceived obstacles in solving a problem. These constraints involve limited resources or doubts about personal efficacy [36]. In this sense, constraint recognition is conceptually close to self-efficacy [35]. When individuals perceive constraints, they may feel less inclined to act because they believe their ability to make changes is limited [36]. Compared to hope, fear tends to amplify constraint recognition because it can make threats appear so overwhelming that individuals feel incapable of addressing them, whereas hope, recognized as a powerful psychological asset when facing challenges [44], often increases one’s perceived control of a situation [17]. Moreover, as a threat seems closer, fearsome outcomes could paralyze individuals more. By contrast, a positive outcome expected to arrive soon can enhance one’s sense of efficacy more than a distant one, thus reducing perceived constraints. Thus, we propose:

H3

Emotional appeals and temporal distance interact to affect constraint recognition. Specifically, fear appeals lead to greater constraint recognition than hope appeals, and this difference is larger when paired with a short-term temporal frame.

To date, STOPS has accumulated substantial empirical evidence supporting its applicability across various contexts, particularly in health settings [36]. Its direct application to explain communicative behaviors related to climate change has been less explored, but there are reasons to believe that it suits this context. First, STOPS is intended to explain people’s communicative actions when confronting a problematic event [36]. Climate change is undoubtedly a global problem that many individuals perceive as personally impactful [45]. Indeed, empirical studies have demonstrated STOPS’ applicability in similar contexts, such as general environmental engagement [46] and hot issues [42]. Moreover, theoretical frameworks in risk research such as Risk Information Seeking and Processing (RISP) [39] and the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB; [47]) have proven effective in predicting behaviors related to climate change with a range of psychological, social, and affective factors [48]. Sharing some constructs and targeting behaviors, STOPS should also be applicable in such a context.

We chose STOPS as the theoretical framework rather than the alternatives mentioned above because, first, compared to TPB, which was developed in 1991 and cited over 100,000 times [47], STOPS is newer and less studied, so more research is needed for theory development. Additionally, compared to the RISP model [39], STOPS is more parsimonious, reducing the risk of over-identification in the model-building process.

Because emotion and psychological distance have been extensively studied as key factors affecting climate engagement [7], examining how they interact with STOPS variables to exert influences would further integrate the literature of climate change and strategic communication, enhancing the predictive ability and external validity of STOPS in this particular context. Moreover, past research has incorporated emotion into the STOPS framework [49,50,51]. However, most of this research consists of surveys that test emotion as an endogenous variable. This approach has provided limited evidence of the causal effects of emotion and has offered few implications for designing messages intended to elicit stronger attitudes toward a problem. This research aims to address this gap.

Once people learn about an issue through communicative behaviors, they may be more willing to take further actions to address the problem due to cognitive consonance. Such a relationship between communicative actions and behavior is well documented. For example, acquiring information about cervical cancer on social media positively predicts the intention to receive HPV vaccines [52]. Similarly, Lee and Rodriguez [53] found that individuals who actively seek information about bioterrorism are more likely to take protective actions related to a bioterrorism attack. Chon and Park [54] discovered that the public’s communicative actions to take and transmit information about infectious disease outbreaks from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) predict their behavioral intention to follow the CDC’s instructions. Thus, we have included behavioral intention as a final outcome variable in the expanded STOPS framework and explore its explanatory power by posing a research question (see Fig. 1 for the proposed model).

Fig. 1

Proposed model

Research question

How effectively does the expanded STOPS model explain behavioral intention in the context of climate change?

Methods

Participants

We recruited 599 participants from Credamo, a Chinese version of Amazon Mechanical Turk, a crowdsourcing platform. Each participant received 3 Chinese Yuan as payment, as recommended by the platform. Participants were mostly female (n = 392), had a bachelor’s degree (n = 433), and were in the age range of 31 to 40 years old (n = 354).

Design and stimuli

The study employs a 2 (Emotion: 0 = Hope, 1 = Fear) X 2 (Distance: 0 = Near, 1 = Far) experimental design. In an online experimental survey, participants were randomly assigned to one of the four conditions: Hope-Long (n = 149), Hope-Short (n = 150), Fear-Long (n = 150), and Fear-Short (n = 150). In all conditions, participants were presented with a public service announcement (PSA) about the Ozone hole. The PSA format emulated articles typically found on public accounts of WeChat, a widely used social media platform in China. Participants then completed an attention check question to identify the topic of the message they had just read, and then responded to more survey questions measuring their emotion, attitudes and behaviors.

In the hope conditions, the message focuses on positive outcomes with an encouraging tone, such as “Take action, the Ozone hole is likely to be recovered in 50 years”, “This is an encouraging news!”, “One of the biggest successes in human ecological protection”, “Let’s keep up with the good work, hoping for the best, and co-create a better future!”. By contrast, the fear condition present negative outcomes with an alarming tone, such as “No action, the Ozone hole will significantly enlarge in 50 years”, This is a worrying news”, “One of the biggest challenges in human ecological protection”, “Let’s make changes, keep alert, and avoid a terrifying future!” in the fear conditions.

To manipulate psychological distance, the messages in both hope and fear conditions describe outcomes related to the ozone hole occurring in either the near or far future. For example, in the long-term distance condition, the messages contain descriptions such as ‘the ozone hole will significantly enlarge in 50 years’ or ‘recover in 50 years,’ and ‘By 2065, global ozone levels will decrease by about 70% compared to the 1980s.’ There is also an image comparing ozone levels in 2023 and 2065 in the far distance condition. By contrast, in the short-term condition, it describes the ozone hole ‘enlarging every year’ or ‘recovering in the near future,’ ‘by 2028, global ozone levels will decrease by about 18% compared to the 1980s,’ and along with an image comparing ozone levels in 2023 and 2028. See Fig. 2 for the stimuli translated into English.

Fig. 2

Experimental stimulus in English

Measures

Please refer to Table 1. Notably, we used a back-translation procedure. The authors first translated the original English scale into Chinese. Then, two assistants re-translated the Chinese version back into English. We compared the resulting English version with the original to ensure consistency and adjusted the Chinese version as necessary. All items were measured on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = Strongly Disagree, 7 = Strongly Agree).

Fear and hope

Eight items were adapted to measure fear and hope [68], including “I feel fear/worried/anxious/nervous” for fear emotion (M = 4.29, SD = 1.60, α = 0.94) and “I feel hope/optimistic/encouraged/positive” for hope emotion (M = 4.30, SD = 1.86, α = 0.95). Two composites were created by averaging the items for each emotion for the manipulation check.

Constraint recognition

Three items were adapted from previous research [42, 53] to measure constraint recognition, including: “I don’t believe I could make a difference in climate change,” “I don’t believe that I could influence the way that climate change is solved,” and “I don’t feel comfortable taking action regarding climate change” (M = 2.24, SD = 0.94, α = 0.73).

Problem recognition

Three items were adapted to measure problem recognition [42], including: “I feel that something needs to be done to improve the situation regarding climate change,” “The current situation is largely different from what I believe it should be regarding climate change” and “I believe people need to pay more attention to climate change.” (M = 5.70, SD = 0.61, α = 0.53). The second item was excluded from subsequent analyses, including Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) and analysis of variance (ANOVA), due to a factor loading lower than 0.4. Please see below for the Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) results.

Involvement recognition

Three items were adapted to measure involvement recognition [42], including: “In my mind, I see a close connection between myself and climate change,” “I feel climate change affects or could affect me personally,” and “I believe climate change could involve me or someone close to me at some point” (M = 5.95, SD = 0.63, α = 0.54).

Situational motivation

Three measures were adapted from previous research [42] to assess situational motivation, including: “I often stop to think about climate change,” “I am curious about climate change,” and “I want to understand climate change better” (M = 5.45, SD = 0.90, α = 0.75).

Reference criterion

Three items were adapted to measure reference criterion, including: “I strongly support a certain way of approaching climate change,” “I have a preferred way for how climate change should be solved,” and “I know how I should behave regarding climate change” (M = 5.42, SD = 0.80, α = 0.66).

According to Kim et al. [42], Communicative Action in Problem Solving comprises a two-level measure, consisting of three latent components: information acquisition, selection, and transmission. Each component was measured with separate items, specifically:

Information acquisition

Six items were adapted from previous research [42, 53] to measure informa

Table 1 Measures and CFA results

tion acquisition. For example: “I searched for information about climate change on the Internet” (Information seeking, M = 5.29, SD = 1.06) and “I pay attention to climate change when a news report appears on TV” (Information attending, M = 5.91, SD = 0.64).

Information selection

Five items were used to measure information selection. For instance: “I am willing to consider different viewpoints on climate change” and “I listen to even contradictory opinions on climate change.” (Information permitting, M = 5.58, SD = 0.76). The second item was excluded from subsequent analyses due to a factor loading lower than 0.4. Additional items included: “I know where to go when I need updated information on climate change” (Information forefending, M = 5.41, SD = 0.90).

Information transmission

Five items were adapted from previous research to measure information transmission, such as: “Unless people ask me, I may not initiate conversation about climate change” and “I talk about this problem only when others bring up the topic of climate change” (Information sharing, M = 3.19, SD = 1.47), and “I have posted my opinion and experience on climate change on the Internet” (Information forwarding, M = 5.02, SD = 1.21). The two items on information sharing were excluded due to highly correlated error terms.

Mitigation behavior

Five items were adapted to measure mitigation behavior [69] (M = 5.83, SD = 0.64, α = 0.74). Examples include: “I intend to use more recyclable and reusable products from now on” and “I intend to join and provide financial support to pro-environmental organizations”.

Results

Manipulation check

An ANOVA was conducted to test whether the messages varied in the emotions and perceived distance they induced among participants. As expected, participants felt more hopeful in the Hope conditions (M = 5.76, SD = 1.02) than in the Fear condition (M = 2.83, SD = 1.24), F (595) = 1004.55, p < .001. In contrast, participants felt more fearful in the Fear condition (M = 5.39, SD = 0.99) than in the Hope condition (M = 3.19, SD = 1.31), F (595) = 537.16, p < .001. Moreover, participants in the long-term distance condition perceived the significant change of the Ozone hole to be further from now (M = 3.56, SD = 1.54) than short-term condition (M = 2.71, SD = 1.22), F (595) = 59.92, p < .001. Thus, the manipulations were successful.

Analysis strategies

To test the hypotheses, a three-step approach was taken. First, a CFA was conducted to test the measurement model. Then, structural equation modeling (SEM) was employed using SPSS AMOS with maximum likelihood estimation to assess the overall model fit. Lastly, an ANOVA was performed to further investigate the interaction effects of emotion and temporal distance.

Confirmatory factor analysis

A CFA was conducted with indicators of all six STOPS variables and behavioral intention variables. Results showed that the model was marginally acceptable based on Hu & Bentler’s [55] combinational rules Chi-Square/Degree of Freedom (CMIN/df) = 3.34, the Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) = 0.85, comparative fit index (CFI) = 0.86, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) = 0.063, standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) = 0.06. To improve the measurement model with minimal modification, we (1) deleted items with factor loadings lower than 0.4 [56], resulting in the omission of two indicators. (2) deleted items with highly correlated error terms, resulting in the omission of two indicators of information sharing (see Table 1 for the four deleted items). Consequently, the reliability and fit improved slightly: Average Cronbach’s α = 0.75, CMIN/df = 3.26, TLI = 0.87, CFI = 0.88, RMSEA = 0.061, and SRMR = 0.06. The following analyses were based on the updated measurement model.

Hypotheses testing

To test whether the expanded STOPS explains the data well, structural equation modeling was conducted using AMOS. The results indicated that the overall model fit was poor: CMIN/df = 4.43, TLI = 0.78, CFI = 0.80, RMSEA = 0.076, SRMR = 0.16, thereby addressing the research question. See Fig. 3 for the SEM results.

Fig. 3

SEM results. Note. * p< .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001. Dash lines represent nonsignificant path coefficients

However, the interaction effects between emotion and distance conditions were significant on problem recognition (β = −0.22, p < .05) and involvement recognition (β = −0.18, p < .05), but not on constraint recognition. We further probed these interaction effects with ANOVA on composites of the three variables (i.e., problem recognition, involvement, and constraint recognition), created by averaging their respective indicators.

Consistent with SEM results, interaction effects were significant on problem recognition and involvement recognition: problem recognition: F (1, 595) = 6.24, p < .05, involvement recognition: F (1, 595) = 5.03, p < .05. Specifically, in the short-term temporal condition, fear (M = 5.90, SD = 0.60, 95% CI: [5.81, 6.00]) induced greater problem recognition than hope (M = 5.47, SD = 0.60, 95% CI: [5.38, 5.57]), F (1, 595) = 11.06, p < .01. Fear (M = 6.02, SD = 0.65, 95% CI: [5.92, 6.12]) also induced greater involvement recognition than hope (M = 5.78, SD = 0.65, 95% CI: [5.68, 5.88]), F (1, 595) = 11.06, p < .01. However, in the long-term temporal condition, there was no difference in problem recognition between the fear condition (M = 5.76, SD = 0.60) and the hope condition (M = 5.66, SD = 0.55), nor in involvement recognition: fear (M = 6.01, SD = 0.62) and hope (M = 6.00, SD = 0.57). Thus, H1 and H2c were partially supported, but the others were not. See Fig. 4 for the interaction effects.

Fig. 4

Interaction effects

Discussion

This research sets out to examine how fear and hope interact with temporal distance framing to influence situational factors identified in STOPS. It finds that fear outperforms hope in inducing both problem recognition and involvement recognition, but this fear advantage is evident only under conditions of short-term temporal distance framing. In other words, fear appeals are more effective than hope appeals when the issue is near. These findings could enhance understanding of the boundary conditions for using emotional appeals in climate change communication, as well as the conceptualization and operationalization of STOPS variables, and provide practical implications for communicating climate change.

As appraisal theories posit fear and hope are two discrete, future-oriented emotions that could trigger very different action tendencies [3, 16, 30], researchers have continuously compared their effects on climate change engagement [5, 14, 17]. By incorporating temporal distance, an important factor that affects how one mentally construes and acts on an event [29], the study contributes to the literature on both emotional appeals and psychological distance. First, this research offers a more nuanced understanding of the differences in the effects of these two emotions on climate engagement. Specifically, it identifies the conditions under which these they differ, how they differ, and their impact on various outcomes. To date, findings related to the main effects of psychological distance and emotional appeals are mixed. By making more specific comparisons, as done in this research, scholars may be more likely to find consistent results. Second, unlike research that focuses on only risk perception (e.g., [14, 19]), this study examines three perceptual variables from STOPS as outcomes of the interaction effects, offering a more systematic investigation of how emotion and temporal distance interacts to influence various climate change-related perceptions essential for problem solvers [35].

Specifically, we found that fear appeals make people perceive climate change as more problematic than hope appeals in short-term temporal frames, but not in long-term frames. Interestingly, the greater gap in problem recognition in both fear and hope appeals is mainly due to decreased problem recognition in the hope-short condition. In contrast, problem recognition remains equally high for fear appeals between the fear-short distance and hope-long distance conditions. This suggests that the pairing of hope with short-distance frames may be most problematic, as it reduces one’s perception of how serious the problem is. For fear appeals, the level of problem recognition they elicit may have reached a ceiling effect, such that portraying it as distant or close does not seem to exert further influence.

A similar pattern in involvement has also been observed. That is, fear leads to greater involvement with the issue than hope appeals in short-term temporal frames. This may be due to the close relationship between problem recognition and involvement recognition [42, 43]. It could also suggest that, in this case, fear appeals do not seem to trigger flight responses and hope appeals do not trigger approach responses. Instead, fear makes climate change seem more personally relevant. Interestingly, involvement recognition is lowest in the hope-near condition. This is surprising, as one might expect individuals to feel positive outcome more relevant that is expected to materialize soon because of its greater certainty to occur. The opposite being true may be because the greater time span in the long-distance condition increases the perceived likelihood that either themselves or their loved ones will be affected. In sum, the finding suggests that despite the effectiveness of fear appeals being increasingly questioned [41], overall, they still stimulate individual reactions (e.g., overall greater problem recognition and involvement recognition) more effectively than hope appeals.

In terms of psychological distance, while many scholars advocate for and attempt to use a short-distance frame to increase engagement, many have been unsuccessful [57]. Consistent with these null findings, our results showed that for fear appeals, neither near nor far distances differed across the three perceptions measured. For hope appeals, making climate change seem closer even reduced problem and involvement recognition. These findings suggest that in general, presenting climate change-related events as more immediate to increase engagement is ineffective. On a related note, this finding has practical implications for designing effective climate change messages: fear appeals should be adopted when reporting on local and immediate climate change consequences. However, when depicting far-future outcomes, the choice of emotion may not matter as much.

This research extends STOPS by incorporating emotion and temporal distance as independent variables, and behavioral intention as the dependent variable. In this model, the STOPS variables serve as mediators between emotion and behavioral intention. This modification has several implications. First, it suggests an extended problem-solving process: the original STOPS model outlines the process as ‘perceiving—motivating—communicating’ about a problem. By incorporating emotion as an antecedent and behavioral intention as an outcome, this expanded STOPS model extends the chain to ‘feeling—perceiving—motivating—communicating—ready to act further,’ consistent with empirical evidence showing that emotion influences perception and cognition [58]. The results show that some of the relationships are significant, providing proof of concept. Second, empirical findings on the effects of emotion and distance appeals on behavior are mixed, suggesting that different or even competing pathways exist in how these variables influence behavior. By examining how psychological distance and emotion influence the three intermediate perceptual variables, this research sought to reveal the various mechanisms co-affecting the outcome. In sum, this research points to future directions for the development of STOPS, aiming to provide a more complete picture of the problem-solving process and strengthen the explanatory power of the model.

There are two notable findings regarding the applicability of the STOPS model in this context. First, the fit of the measurement model of STOPS was suboptimal. Some indicators showed low factor loadings (e.g., Problem Recognition) and correlated error terms (e.g., Information Sharing). STOPS variables have been inconsistently measured across research, even in studies involving one of the original authors, J.N. Kim [32, 54, 59, 60]. Although Kim & Grunig [35] proposed a working measure, few researchers have adopted it, likely due to its length (> 100 questions). This may also explain the variation in measures used, resulted from researchers selecting different subsets of items from the scale. Notably, the measures selected for our study are reasonable; we primarily adopted measures from Jiang et al. [46] because their study on environmental issues among Chinese populations is similar to our research topic and targeted population. Moreover, it was co-authored by J.N. Kim and published in a reputable peer-reviewed journal, suggesting the quality of the measures should be acknowledged. However, we found that our measurement model did not achieve as good a fit as reported in Jiang et al. [46]. This underscores the need to validate the measurement of STOPS variables across different contexts, populations, and research methods. It is also necessary to develop a shorter scale that can be consistently used across studies. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of comparing the conceptualization of STOPS variables with related constructs such as risk perception, perceived relevance, and self-efficacy, ensuring that different operationalizations remain true to the original conceptual meanings. Before consensus is reached on the STOPS measures, future research on STOPS may use the more comprehensive scales [61] or report the decision-making process for selecting those measures over the existing alternatives.

Second, problem recognition was found to be unrelated to situational motivation. These findings suggest that as relevant empirical evidence accumulates, it may be useful to reconsider some of the proposed relationships in the model. To this end, a meta-analysis could be helpful. It enables researchers to systematically evaluate the effectiveness of STOPS in explaining communicative actions, as what researchers have done for other risk communication models, for example, RISP [48] and Reduced Risk Information Seeking model (RISK) [62].

We study within the context of the ozone hole, which is relatively novel and appropriate for studying climate change. First, it is a directly climate change-related issue [63]. Yet, compared to other climate change-related issues such as floods [64], wildfires [65], droughts [66], and air pollution [67], most people do not have direct experience with the consequences of ozone depletion, making it equally relevant for everyone. At the same time, it is a concrete and emotionally compelling issue for many [68], preventing disengagement from the topic. Moreover, while extreme weather events become more common [69] and noticeable [70], good news such as ozone recovery is rare. Using it to study positive emotions such as hope could be more convincing. Lastly, ozone hole messages are less prevalent compared to iconic visuals or texts depicting polar bears and melting icebergs, so people are less likely to be desensitized to these messages. In short, with these unique characteristics, the ozone hole presents a novel and rich context for studying climate change communication.

Some notable limitations of this study include, first, while the study focuses on hope and fear, they do not represent all emotional responses to climate change. Other equally prevalent and important discrete emotions, such as worry and anxiety [71], are also worthwhile to explore. Second, the study overrepresents females and participants with higher education, who are believed to be more environmentally concerned [72]. It is also exclusively conducted among Chinese participants. There are some advantages to studying this population; for example, it shifts away from the hyperfocus on Western residents in climate change communication research [73]. Additionally, because China is currently the world’s largest carbon emitter [74], yet few citizens are actively engaged [75], mobilizing this large but inactive population is crucial. Still, further investigation is needed to understand how other populations may react to these messages. Moreover, given the prevalence of fear and hope in public discourse on climate change and the growing scholarly interest in determining the more optimal strategies between fear and hope appeals [5, 14, 15, 28, 32], this research sought to contribute to this line of inquiry by comparing the effects of hope and fear appeals in different levels of temporal distance. Future research could include a control condition with either no message or neutral messages to provide more comparisons of these effects in climate change communication.

Conclusion

Both fear and hope appeals, as well as psychological distance framing have been applied in public discourse to motivate action on climate change. While empirical evidence for their independent effects is accumulating, this study takes a step further by investigating their interaction effects on climate change-related perceptions and behaviors. The findings show that fear outperforms hope appeals when combined with short-term distance framing, suggesting that depicting climate change as impending doom and gloom works most effectively for influencing climate change perceptions for Chinese participants than as upcoming hope and boom. The study also revealed that the measurement model and expanded structural model of STOPS did not fit the data very well, highlighting the need for cross-context scale validation research and systematic re-evaluation of proposed relationships within STOPS. In sum, by identifying the conditional effects of hope and fear on climate engagement, this research offers better understanding of the differential effects of fear and hope appeals and provides implications for refining the strategic use of emotional appeals in climate change communication.