Two in Three Call Climate Change Serious; Many Still See Scientific Disagreement (POLL)

— -- Nearly two-thirds of Americans call climate change a serious problem facing the United States, with more than half calling it very serious. But those numbers have slipped in the past year and a half, marking lingering doubts about the issue’s severity among a minority of adults.

Underscoring that doubt, just 43 percent in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll think most scientists agree that global warming is happening. While that’s a new high in polls back nearly 20 years, 51 percent still think there’s a lot of disagreement among scientists on the issue.

It makes a difference, because people who think that scientists agree about the issue are far more likely than others also to see climate change as a serious problem and to support additional action by the federal government to address it.

See PDF with full results, charts and tables here.

As things stand, a new low, 47 percent, say the federal government should do more than it is doing now to try to deal with global warming, down from a high of 70 percent under the Bush administration eight years ago. This likely reflects increased action on the issue under the Obama administration; indeed more, 32 percent, say the government is doing the right amount, up 11 points. Many fewer say it’s doing too much – 18 percent, also up 11 points.

This survey, produced for ABC News by Langer Research Associates, was conducted in advance of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris this week. It finds that 63 percent of Americans see climate change as a serious issue, with 52 percent saying it’s very serious.

Those numbers have declined by 6 and 5 points, respectively, from an ABC/Post poll in June 2014. Thirty-six percent say climate change is not a serious problem at all, up 7 points.

Public assessments of the issue may be impacted by more immediate concerns about terrorism, given the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris. Questions on climate change in this poll directly followed questions about terrorism, and some respondents may have seen climate change as less pressing in comparison.

Regardless, views on scientific consensus are important. Among those who think most scientists agree on climate change, 84 percent call it a serious problem, 74 percent call it very serious and 65 percent think the government should do to more to address it. Among those who think there’s a lot of disagreement among scientists, these numbers fall to 46, 33 and 33 percent, respectively.

Political split

Opinions on the issue remain highly politicized. Eight in 10 Democrats call climate change a serious problem, as do 62 percent of independents; this drops to 43 percent among Republicans. Fifty-seven percent of Democrats think most scientists agree on the issue, while two-thirds of Republicans feel the opposite.

Just 22 percent of Republicans favor additional government action on the issue, compared with 47 percent of independents and two-thirds of Democrats. Still, even among Republicans, just a third say the government should be doing less than it is now to try to address the issue.

Groups

In terms of change over time, the decline in those wanting the government to do more is spread evenly across the political spectrum. However, compared with 2007, Democrats are 17 points more apt to say the government is doing the right amount; Republicans and independents, respectively, are 19 and 13 points more likely to say it’s doing too much.

The sense that most scientists agree on the issue, at 43 percent, is up from a low of 30 percent in early 1998 and up from 36 percent when last asked in late 2009. It’s up by about 10 points since 2009 among independents and Republicans, while essentially unchanged among Democrats.

Methodology

This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by landline and cellular telephone Nov. 16-19, 2015, in English and Spanish, among a random national sample of 1,004 adults. Results have a margin of sampling error of 3.5 points, including the design effect. Partisan divisions are 33-23-36 percent, Democrats-Republicans-independents.

The survey was produced for ABC News by Langer Research Associates of New York, N.Y., with sampling, data collection and tabulation by Abt-SRBI of New York, N.Y. See details on the survey’s methodology here.