Before and After The Day After Tomorrow.

This article discusses the impact of the film, "The Day After Tomorrow," on the public's perception of global climate change risk. On Memorial Day weekend 2004, Twentieth Century Fox released "The Day After Tomorrow," a disaster movie depicting an abrupt and catastrophic climate change. In the movie, a global warming-induced shutdown of the North Atlantic thermohaline circulation system[1] triggers extreme weather events worldwide and subsequently a new ice age, with wrenching global consequences. Before it even hit the theaters, however, the movie generated an intense storm of media controversy as scientists, politicians, advocacy groups, and political pundits debated the scientific accuracy and political implications of the movie and global climate change. Numerous predictions were made as to how the movie would influence risk perceptions and attitudes of the U.S. public toward global warming. To answer this question, a national study was conducted to explore the public impact of "The Day After Tomorrow." The study included two nationally representative surveys of the U.S. public. The first survey was implemented a week before the movie's release and the second was done four weeks later, after the movie had played in theaters for three full weekends. The second survey also oversampled movie "watchers" to allow comparative analysis with "nonwatchers." Overall, watchers and nonwatchers demonstrated high levels of concern about global warming yet lower levels of worry.[16] While many Americans are concerned about global warming, fewer of them actively worry about it. This helps to explain the seeming paradox between public opinion surveys that show Americans expressing high concerns about the issue yet giving it low priority in either national or environmental issue rankings. Overall, these results show that "he Day After Tomorrow"had a considerable impact on the global-warming risk perceptions of those who saw the movie.