Q4. Do you think climate change will have an affect on Canada/Vancouver in...

We could measure something like this with categories like: "in the next 20 years" "in the next 40 years" "in the next 60 years" "in the next 80 years" "in the next 100 year." I know that this does not capture people who do not think climate change is an issue, now or in the future. Any suggestions?

This is seems a bit too open to interpretation and may be difficult to phrase in a question. What exactly are you trying to ask? ie what answer would you like to hear?

I agree that this is vague in terms of survey questions. "An affect" could mean many things.

I do think a question along these lines would be good for measuring how many people think climate change is an impending threat or something that will not result in any impact for a very long time. Unfortunately, I'm not quite sure how to word a successful question evaluating this feeling in participants. Maybe instead of "an affect" we could say "a noticeable affect"

I think we should limit it to either Vancouver or Canada instead of Canada/Vancouver. After all, there are those may feel that environmental changes will have an ____ effect on Vancouver but another ____ effect on Canada.

So...how about

Climate change will have a lasting effect on Canada's environment in the next 20 years. (1) Strongly Agree (2) Somewhat Agree (3) Neutral (4) Somewhat Disagree (5) Strongly Disagree (6) Not Applicable

Yes I agree with the question above, it is very concise and I too see a problems if we fail to separate Canada and Vancouver. I also think that it could be measured on a 1-5 scale, asking;

To what extent do you believe climate change will have a lasting effect on Canada's environment in the next 20 years? 1 = little effect, through to 5 = devastating permanent effect.

Through this means of measurement you gain perspective into the extent of how bad the population believes the effects of climate change will be rather than a general perception of the lasting effects.

Sorry for the confusion, but I had put up Vancouver/Canada as a way of asking which you all thought we should ask about. I never intended it to be both, just one or the other. I think that NielChah's question is pretty good, but 20 seems kind of arbitrary. I was just wondering why you picked that over some other number. As long as we are going to pick a definite time I think it should be a little bit farther into the future than 20 years. If we used 40 or 50 years, for example, we would be better able to analyze how ideas about what will happen far in the future affect the decisions we take today.

Ah, thanks for explaining that Benjamin, I didn't realize from the phrasing of the sentence :) As for 20 years, it was my arbitrary phrasing of the question to get it off the ground, so to say. Yes, I think asking 50 years into the future is just as useful and important for gauging the "future".

What if we phrased it like this - Climate change will have a noticeable effect on Canada's environment in the next ___ a)25 years b)50 years c)100 years e)0 years - Climate change will NOT have a lasting effect on Canada's environment d) 0 years - Climate change HAS ALREADY noticeably affected Canada's environment. That way we can still gauge as Benjamin Black suggested perceptions about climate change/future. I feel that if our answers are e.g. 1=little effect through 5=devastating permanent effect as Anna suggested, they will not be as reliable and they will be harder to read/analyze since they are very open to different interpretations ('devastating permanent effects' will probably be very different for different people). Otherwise I think Niel's question: Climate change will have a lasting effect on Canada's environment in the next 20 years. (1) Strongly Agree (2) Somewhat Agree (3) Neutral (4) Somewhat Disagree (5) Strongly Disagree (6) Not Applicable is probably more concise and easier to answer. I would change the 20years to 50 years though.

I am a big fan of the question raised by Jes, the question allows us to interpret how pressing of a matter climate change is. The other questions would be much harder to interpret. Perhaps instead of listing 0 years, we could list not applicable, as climate change will not have a lasting effect on Canada's environment.

The question and comment rased by Shannon gets to the crux of the matter. Ones perception of future climate change impacts. I am worried that 'Canada' is quite broad and will be very difficult for the surveyee to respond to easily and giving years may require some expert/education on the matter. I personally believe climate change will have an affect but would not comfortable estimating when?

We could rephrase it to be driven towards an individual.

What kind of effect to do you think climate change will have on your life in the next ___ years? and maybe put a intro phrase in first like: Climate change has brought effects of temperature increases, pollution, soil erosion, arable land availabilty and many others to Canada and this phenomena is believed to be increasing...what kind of effect...

and a 1-5 scale of Strong Affect Somewhat Affect Neutral Little Affect No Affect

Option A: Climate change will have a lasting effect on Canada's environment in the next 50 years. (1) Strongly Agree (2) Somewhat Agree (3) Neutral (4) Somewhat Disagree (5) Strongly Disagree (6) Not Applicable

Option B: Climate change will have a noticeable effect on Canada's environment in the next ___ a)25 years b)50 years c)100 years d)0 years - Climate change HAS ALREADY noticeably affected Canada's environment e)Not Applicable - Climate change will NOT have a lasting effect on Canada's environment.

Or as AarondeepBains mentions, Option C: Climate change has brought effects of temperature increases, pollution, soil erosion, [decreases in] arable land availability and many others to Canada, and this phenomena is believed to be increasing. What kind of effect do you think climate change will have on your life in the next [50] years? a)Strong Effect b)Some Effect c)Neutral d)Little Effect e) No Effect f) Not Applicable

Put side by side, Option B seems to be a better measure of how much of an impact environmental changes will have, by putting the survey question choices into # of years. Option A does have the flaw of arbitrarily deciding on '20' or '50' years as the tipping point. The third question asks something a bit different from the first two. It runs into the same 'problem' of picking a certain # of years as the tipping point [I put in 50 years for now. If it were to be left blank, then that would mean the Question would be affected in 2 ways: "what kind of effect" and "# of years"].

I choose to support Option B as the Q4.

I also support option B. Option A would be hard to interpret the results, and option C leaves too much open to interpretation. What some may describe as some effect others may define as neutral or strong.

Another vote for Option B. I just think we need to make sure that not all of our final questions reference climate change as a gauge for sustainability impacts

This question is a good one! Since we will be testing the question on canadian citizens, more specifically british columbia residents, it would allow us to see how the proximity of an environmental problem influences citizen opinion and the actions they will take in return. But my one concern is, because we will be using this survey on UBC students, there are lots of international students here that are not Canadian, so we would need to control this "Z variable" of international students, unless we actually want to compare the opinions of canadians and foreigners.

I'm all for option B. I was under the impression that we were going to be able to ask anyone in Vancouver. If that is the case it would be easy enough to go downtown and just screen out people who are not Canadian by asking.

Ok sorry but I am very confused about this question. What are we trying to gauge here? When people think climate change will effect them or their region? or How large a possible impact on them will be? - This is a super case sensitive question where answers will be very varied and could pose difficulty in the analysis of data post survey. If we want to understand how people feel about climate change, its timeline and perhaps the region they live in then we should have potential uses for such data in mind. 25 or 50 seems very arbitrary to an individual who may have little to know experience in climate change literature etc. Perhaps something along this line:

Do you believe climate change will personally affect your life choices (such as consumption choices, fuel type etc. - whatever we like here) in the next ___ years (I personally feel that anything more than 20 years is too much to logically gauge in ones life, so 10 or 15 should be good)? and even adding an intro sentence such as Climate change has had pronounced international effects with rising temperatures, increases (yes increases, not decreases, error above) in arable land and climate pattern changes. Do you believe...

What do you guys think?

I think that Aarondeep Bains is right to say that the initially formulated question is too vague. We don't really know what it is measuring as it sounds like a statement that is neither positive or negative. I think Aaron's version could be a nice alternative. I would say that if we want to know it the person will feel personally concerned about climate change it should not be more than 30 years because after that they would probably care less or case only indirectly for their kids. However, I think that by adding the sentence("Climate change has had pronounced..." ) we are influencing too much the answer because we are actually saying: everyone says it has some effect, do you think it will affect you ? Which I think it's too biased in favor of the yes.

What about rephrasing it in order to have a scale (from 1 to 5 or something similar)? I always feel that people would never say no because it's too extreme, but they might say, "somehow".

My understanding of the question was that it is gauging people's actual belief in climate change- Do they think it currently has an impact or will have an impact. This question does leave out people who think climate change is a hoax and will never have an impact because it is untrue- yes they do exist! Additionally, it gauges their understanding as to the progression of climate change- will the ramifications of their actions be felt during their life time or will the impacts only appear after they are gone?

Reading it from a different perspective that comments have brought up I understand how it could also be viewed as a question of how environmental practices impact a specific region such as Canada or Vancouver since that is the region mentioned. If that was the intention of the questions it definitely needs to be re-worded.

My only concern is how possible it is for someone to gauge the impact of climate change in such an unforseeable future (50 years !!!). We have to give people a possibility to answer logically. Caroline you are right about the bias. Perhaps it could be reworded so that we simply say that: there is a great degree of debate regarding the impact of future climate change...do you believe...?