Narrating the UK’s adaptation to a changing climate: Identifying the most prominent adaptation narratives from the public discourse and understanding how engaging they are for UK residents

The UK will experience more frequent and more extreme weather patterns in the coming decades. Climate change adaptation intends to reduce the likelihood that climate change impacts will cause harm and to reduce the severity of unavoidable harm, as well as to take advantage of new opportunities. Engagement in adaptation by UK residents is important as they can take actions which improve their own safety and which contribute to local and national adaptation objectives. However, research so far shows that individual engagement with adaptation is low. There is a need, therefore, to make adaptation a more engaging topic for UK residents. In this thesis I respond to this challenge by firstly analysing the current public discourse of adaptation. I undertook two studies to do this: a secondary analysis of interviews with UK residents and a narrative analysis of UK newspaper articles. Secondly, I evaluated how engaging the current adaptation public discourse is for UK residents and worked with research participants to develop ideas to make it more so. Here I undertook a further two studies: a series of storytelling workshops and a quantitative survey with a national sample. I found that the content and approach used in the newspaper discourse differs from the areas of interest and engagement identified by UK residents, and as such adaptation newspaper coverage is perceived as ineffective in inspiring greater individual involvement. Instead, a clearer sense of the urgency and meaningfulness of the risks for people’s everyday lives and more clarity on what roles individuals can play in the adaptation story are suggested as ways to make the discourse more engaging. This thesis provides novel insight into the UK’s adaptation discourse which is essential information for those tasked with communicating adaptation. It also develops and tests ways to make engagement more effective which provides useful information for adaptation practitioners and areas of development for further research.