Trust and influence

To transition to a low-carbon society, we need to be able to trust the wide range of people and organisations that can help get us there.

As communicators, we also want our audience to trust us. But we know that trust in certain institutions is low at the moment. And we know that not everyone is trusted to talk about climate change.

We look to surveys exploring ‘trusted climate messengers’ to help us work out who can persuade those we struggle to reach and connect with. But do we have a good handle on why certain people and groups are trusted? How trust works? How it’s earned or lost?

And what can we – as communicators – do to build it?

Our new research explores these questions. It’s designed to help climate communicators explore the concept of trust, and become better equipped at building it. Because earning trust at the scale we need goes beyond finding the right messenger or influencer.

At Climate Outreach we believe everyone can become more trusted when they’re talking about climate. This requires us to dig deep, and to better understand ourselves and each other.

Our report is designed to help you explore how to do that:

This report builds on our previous work looking at trusted messengers and trust in media. Like all of Britain Talks Climate, the research uses the seven British segments as a lens to think about trust and influence in climate communications.

Find out more about the seven segments’ views on climate change.

Find out how to put our research into practice.