Elderly and young people agree on living climate-friendly, but not on who is better at it
"I already live climate-friendly and I am furious at the wasteful consumption of the youth. They have a consumption of everything that is completely beyond comprehension.” This is the response of an elderly person answering the question of whether it is possible to live more climate-friendly.
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Excerpt from the article:
"So what do they agree on? Both generations are concerned with the seriousness of the climate issue and express great concern. Both say they want to live climate-friendly (to a very large, large or some degree) with a focus on climate-friendly transport and mobility, waste sorting/recycling and reduced consumption (a difference among the elderly shows that women are more concerned and more concerned with living climate-friendly than men ).
When asked if there is something they are not willing to give up, even if they know it is damaging the climate, there is also a rather surprising coincidence:
Although they emphasize public transport as important for climate-friendly living, it is a long way off for both generations to give up car use and holiday travel by air. Stopping eating meat is also something they hesitate to approve."
The article in full is available in Norwegian here: forskersonen.no (21.11.22)
The article is based on a report by the CLIMLIFE project on the results of a survey on the attitudes of the elderly (65+) to climate and lifestyle.
The survey addressed questions such as "how worried are you about climate change?", "to what extent do you want to live climate-friendly?" and many more.
The survey was carried out by NORSTAT on behalf of the CLIMLIFE project. The report, authored by Kjersti Fløttum and Emil Perron, is available here: https://www.uib.no/en/rg/lingclim/139228/climlife.
Several of the questions in the elderly survey are identical or comparable to questions asked in a school survey with 381 respondents with an average age of 17, which was carried out in the period January - March 2021.
See more about the school survey here: Fløttum, K., Scheurer, J., Dahl, T. 2021. Report - CLIMLIFE school survey, University of Bergen, https://www.uib.no/en/rg/lingclim/139228/climlife .
