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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Commun.
Sec. Science and Environmental Communication
Volume 9 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fcomm.2024.1366289

Changing minds about climate change in Indonesia through a TV drama

Provisionally accepted
Donald P. Green Donald P. Green 1*Rosiana Eko Rosiana Eko 2Lionel Ong Lionel Ong 1Benedek Paskuj Benedek Paskuj 3Anna Godfrey Anna Godfrey 3Ankur Garg Ankur Garg 4Helena Rea Helena Rea 2
  • 1 Columbia University, New York City, United States
  • 2 BBC Media Action, Jakarta, Indonesia
  • 3 BBC Media Action, London, UK, London, United Kingdom
  • 4 BBC Media Action, New Delhi, India, New Delhi, India

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Drama has been shown to change attitudes and inspire action on topics as diverse as health, sanitation, intergroup conflict and gender equality, but rarely have randomized trials assessed the influence of narrative entertainment programs focusing on climate change and environmental protection. We report the results of an experiment in which young Indonesian adults were sampled from five metropolitan areas. Participants were randomly assigned to watch a condensed two-hour version of a new awardwinning TV drama series #CeritaKita (Our Story) -and accompanying social media discussion program Ngobrolin #CeritaKita (Chatter -Our Story) -as opposed to a placebo drama/discussion that lacked climate and environmental content. Outcomes were assessed via survey one to seven days after exposure to the shows, and through a follow up survey after five months. We find that the treatment group became significantly more knowledgeable about environmental issues such as deforestation, an effect that persists long term. Other outcomes, such as motivation to participate in public discussion on climate change, willingness to follow influencers who post about environmental issues on social media, support for policies to address climate change and support for more media coverage of this issue, moved initially after viewing but subsided over time, possibly due to lack of continued exposure and other changes in context. This pattern of results suggests that ongoing/ seasonal programming may be needed in order to sustain attitudinal and behavioral change, draw media market investments, and change public narratives at scale when it matters most.

    Keywords: Climate Change, environment, deforestation, entertainment program, randomized trial

    Received: 09 Jan 2024; Accepted: 24 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Green, Eko, Ong, Paskuj, Godfrey, Garg and Rea. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Donald P. Green, Columbia University, New York City, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.