By Bhavana KunkalikarJun 23 2023Reviewed by Lily Ramsey, LLM In a recent study published in the Scientific Reports Journal, researchers explored the association between mental imagery and emotional perception of climate change risks.
The study operationalizes risk as the perceived risk of climate change among participants, in response to the growing environmental risk of adverse events due to climate change. The pleasantness level exhibited by participants was assessed using a single item to measure valence. Also, the activation level was evaluated using a single thing to measure arousal. The participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions, namely, spontaneous mental imagery , prevented mental imagery, and enhanced mental imagery.
The study also found a significant interaction effect between time and condition, suggesting that the strength of the alteration in perceived risk differed across the conditions. The second planned comparison compared the spontaneous mental imagery condition with the prevented condition. The study revealed a significant main effect of time, no main effect of condition, and an interaction effect.