Climate change in textbooks

Climate change is a potent threat to human society, biodiversity, and
ecosystem stability. Yet a 2021 Gallup poll found that only 43% of
Americans see climate change as a serious threat over their lifetimes. In
this study, we analyze college biology textbook coverage of climate change
from 1970 to 2019. We focus on four aspects for document analysis: 1) the
amount of coverage, determined by counting the number of sentences within
the climate change passage, 2) the start location of the passage in the
book, 3) the categorization of sentences as addressing a description of
the greenhouse effect, impacts of global warming, or actions to ameliorate
climate change, and 4) the presentation of data in figures. We analyzed 57
textbooks. Our findings show that coverage of climate change has
continually increased. However, the greatest increase occurred during the
1990s, despite the growing threats of climate change. The position of the
climate change passage moved further back in the book, from the last 15%
to the last 2.5% of pages. Over time, coverage shifted from a description
of the greenhouse effect to focus mostly on effects of climate change; the
most addressed impact was shifting ecosystems. Sentences dedicated to
actionable solutions to climate change peaked in the 1990s at over 15% of
the passage, then decreased in recent decades to 3%. Data figures present
only global temperatures and CO2 levels prior to the year 2000, then
include photographic evidence and changes to species distributions after
2000. We hope this study will alert curriculum designers and instructors
to consider implicit messages communicated in climate change lessons.