Institute of Advanced Studies

What We Need to Know about Ourselves to Deal with Climate Change

By Winthrop Professor Carmen Lawrence, Director, Centre for the Study of Social Change, School of Psychology, The University of Western Australia.

Scientific evidence indicates that climate change is the result of rising levels of greenhouse gases which are, in turn, due to human behaviours, such as burning fossil fuels and clearing forests. Equally, many of the recommendations to reduce these emissions and to facilitate adaptation to a changed climate depend on people changing their behaviour. From changing our patterns of settlement to modifying our diets, there is no doubt that we need to change - and on a scale that has never before been contemplated. Yet the scientists who study human behaviour and societies have not been part of the global debate about climate change and how to deal with it.

In this lecture, Dr Lawrence explored why this must be remedied and outlined what we know – and need to know - about human psychology (including our occasional irrationality) to make any progress in crafting workable solutions to the problem of climate change.

About the Gentilli Memorial Lecture

The University of Western Australia established this memorial lecture in 2005 to honour the memory and intellectual legacy of an influential and long serving scholar who devoted 60 years of his life to this institution. Joseph Gentilli (1912-2000) commenced teaching at the University soon after arriving in Fremantle from Italy in 1939, and continued to be actively involved with the Department of Geography until 2000.

During his long and distinguished career at UWA, Joseph Gentilli helped to bring about a comprehensive understanding of the climates of Australia. In addition to his many other contributions, he wrote about “the selective or “greenhouse” effect of the atmosphere” more than 50 years ago (A Geography of Climate, The University of Western Australia, 1952), and more than 30 years ago was calling for an understanding of how climate patterns were changing (Australian Climate Patterns, Nelson, 1972).

This lecture is presented by the School of Earth and Environment and the Institute of Advanced Studies at UWA.

Tuesday 25 May 2010