While millions of people care deeply about the environment, only a fraction take action on climate change. New research has uncovered the psychological reasons why some people get involved while others don’t.
“The public conversation around climate activism, especially radical activism, tends to be pretty reductive,” said lead author on the study, Dr Susilo Wibisono, Lecturer in the School of Psychology at Murdoch University.
“Climate supporters are often treated as though they are one collective group, but we wanted to find out how they are unique, and what drives them.”
The research team, from Murdoch University, the University of Queensland, Flinders University, Georgetown University and The Universite du Quebec a Montreal, conducted two online surveys of around 500 people in the United States who supported climate action.
Using a standard psychology test, participants rated themselves on their personality, their group identity, their attitudes to power and hierarchy, and how likely they were to take part in climate action.
The study found that climate supporters fall into three distinct types.
“The first are your classic activists — people who are organised, cooperative, and are genuinely invested in the social issue,” Dr Wibisono said.
“They're the ones most likely to do conventional things like signing petitions or joining groups.”
“The second, is people who are more anxious and unsure of themselves. They want to help but can't quite get themselves moving,” he said.
“They're not strongly identified with the climate movement, and that combination of emotional sensitivity without a strong anchor group leaves them kind of stuck in-between.”
Dr Wibisono said the findings in the third group were the most surprising.
“The third group tend to be more disruptive about tactics, but not necessarily because they’re very passionate about the climate,” he said.
“These people tend to be hierarchy enhancers — people who support the idea that some groups should have more power than others.
“You wouldn't expect this type of person to be a climate activist at all, but they showed up in our data as the group which was actually the most drawn to radical action.
“Our interpretation for this group is that their radical tactics might be less about climate justice and more about expressing a competitive side of their personality.”
Dr Wibisono hopes the research will give the public a more nuanced viewed of climate activists.
“Our studies show that climate supporters are not all the same, and what motivates one type of person can be completely different to another,” he said.
“So rather than blasting out one generic call to action, movements would benefit from thinking more carefully about who they're actually talking to and what that person's psychological starting point is.”
The study, Using person-centred analyses to predict engagement in collective action for the climate , was published in the journal Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology .
Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology
Survey
People
Using person-centred analyses to predict engagement in collective action for the climate
12-Mar-2026
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.